SUNDAY  TALKS, 


OB, 


GLEANINGS  IN  VARIOUS  FIELDS  OF  THOUGHT, 


OF  THE 

T.   T.   O^T-E^T,     [  UNIVERSITY  ) 

OF 


Editor  San  JDSE  (Cal,,)  Mercury, 


SAN  JOSE: 

MERCURY    PRINTING   AND  PUBLISHING   COMPANV 
1883 


Copyright  Secursd, 


TO  THE  COMPANION,   TRIED  AND  TRUE, 
OF  MY  EARLY  AND  LATER  YEARS, 

MY  BELOVED  WIFE, 
WHOSE  GENTLE  SPIRIT  PASSED  ON 

TO  THE 

HOME  OF  THE  IMMORTALS, 
JULY  10TH,   1883, 

THIS  VOLUME 
IS  REVERENTLY  DEDICATED. 


134840 


PEEFAOE. 


UNDER  the  general  heading  of  "  Our  Sunday  Talks,"  most  of 
the  matter  of  the  following  pages  has  appeared,  from  time  to 
time,  in  the  Sunday  editions  of  the  SAN  JOSE  DAILY  MERCURY. 
The  shorter  articles  and  poems  have  also  appeared  in  the  same 
paper.  Upon  the  solicitation  of  a  number  of  readers,  \vho 
seem  to  think  these  matters  worthy  of  preservation  in  book 
form,  I  have  here  brought  them  together,  revised  and  pruned 
of  the  crudities  and  imperfections  that  marred  their  first  appear- 
ance,—  written,  as  they  usually  were,  like  most  of  the  editorials 
of  a  daily  paper,  under  the  spur,  with  but  little  time  for  reflec- 
tion, and  none  for  revision.  In  this  second  edition  I  have 
added  a  large  number  of  new  topics,  thereby  giving  the  work  a 
more  comprehensive  scope.  Hoping  that  these  "Talks  "  may 
be  received  in  the  friendly  spirit  in  which  they  were  uttered; 
and  further,  that  they  may  be  the  means  of  helping  some  strug- 
gling soul  to  clearer  views  of  life  and  duty,  this  little  volume  is 
sent  forth  to  the  world  by 

THE  AUTHOR. 


INDEX. 


PAGE 

A  True  Gentleman 64 

Across  the  Bar 136 

Act  Well  Your  Part    137 

A  Spring  Morning 170 

Agreeing  to  Disagree 199 

After  All       216 

A  Day  of   llest 230 

At  Their  Best   .....    237 

Beginning  to  Walk    12 

Better  As  It  Is 68 

Bending  Before  the  Gale    95 

Contentment    41 

Companionship      38 

Crab-Apple  Dignity 92 

Calloused  Sympathies      145 

Cleopatra's   Dream    250 

Don't    129 

Evil  Habits 79 

Freemasonry  of  Brains     ;    38 

Generosity 105 

*Hunian  Sympathy 24 

Heroism  in  Common  Life 184 

Harmless  Self-Conceit 218 

Introductory 9 

Inspiration  of  Good  Deeds    54 

Illiberal  Liberalism 108 

"  I  Don't  Know,"    177 

Job's  Query ...  207 

Know  Thyself 17 

Keep  to  the  Right 89 

Learn  to  Wait            16 

Life  a  Training  School    21 

Life's  Temple ...           66 

Life's  First  Lessons          ...  233 

Love  of  the  Beautiful 242 

Modest  Doubters    27 

Musings ...  83 

M;iti-ri:ilistu .  174 


Vll  INDEX. 

My  Island  Honu-    240 

Night 158 

Nature    196 

Not  to  be  Wondered  At 212 

Our  Young  Men 75 

Our  Ancestors 117 

Organization 121 

Old  Age    192 

Our  Spider 245 

Passing  On    98 

Piety  of  Fun  115 

Passing  On  127 

Philosophy  of   I  ife   155 

Power  of  Love 181 

Parental  Government    222 

Religious  Gambling , 101 

Resignation 115 

Religion  of  Humanity 149 

Random  Thoughts 247 

Somewhere 38 

Sunday 71 

Sophistries 85 

Self-Dependence • Ill 

Single  Blessedness 153 

Something  and  Nothing  ....  187 

Sunset    • 226 

The  Logic  of  Poverty 31 

The  Religion  of  Laughter 58 

Truth  Spoken  in  Jest 164 

Through  Suffering 203 

Unsolved  Problems 45 

Uses  of  Temptation 50 

Unprofitable  Scolding 61 

Value  of  Riches 141 

What  of  the  Night 132 

What  We  Differ  About 138 

What  is  Religion    .  160 

Work  .    168 


UNIVERSITY 


INTRODUCTORY, 


wish  it  understood  that  these  "  talks" 
are  from  a  secular  standpoint  wholly, 
and  are  intended  to  be  entirely  free  from 
dogmatism  or  assumption  of  any  kind.  We 
shall  aim  to  impinge  on  no  one's  private  belief 
—offend  no  one's  conscience.  There  is  a 
common  ground  upon  which  all  right  thinking 
people  can  meet  and  agree  ;  there  are  a 
thousand  topics  and  themes  affecting  the 
welfare  of  humanity,  concerning  which  no 
creeds  can  divide  honest  minds.  It  is  in  this 
vast  field  of  thought  we  shall  meet  you, 
reader,  as  a  friend  and  a  neighbor,  hoping 
you  may  find  something  in  our  "talks"  to 
interest,  if  not  instruct. 


10  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

We  have  analyzed  closely  the  motives  that 
govern  human  action — have  thought  much  of 
the  frailties  and  weaknesses  of  human  nature, 
and  sought  to  fathom  their  causes — have 
sought  to  determine  why  it  is  that  one  man 
preys  upon,  and  another  seeks  the  welfare  of, 
society.  Whatever  conclusions — partial  only 
at  best — we  may  have  reached,  our  researches 
into  this  mystic  realm  of  causation — of  moral 
forces — have  taught  us  a  lesson  of  charity 
for  human  imperfections,  a  larger  exercise 
of  which  in  the  world  would,  we  believe, 
start  the  race  a  long  way  in  the  direction  of 
that  "  good  time  coming,"  which  has  been  the 
dream  of  the  prophet  and  the  inspiration  of 
the  poet,  in  all  ages  of  the  world. 

Goodness  we  find  to  be  all  one  thing, 
whether  practiced  by  saint  or  sinner,  pagan 
or  Christian ;  except  that  it  is,  perhaps,  a 
higher  virtue  when  practiced  by  one  who 
counts  on  no  reward  therefor.  And  evil  is 
the  same  in  quality  the  world  over,  no  matter 
what  the  belief  or  profession  of  the  individual 
may  be  who  practices  it.  The  measure  of 
merit  or  demerit  in  the  exercise  of  either, 
depends  upon  many  circumstances.  We  have 


INTRODUCTORY.  I  I 

no  right  to  expect  apples  of  thorns  nor  figs 
of  thistles.  Neither  should  we  expect  too 
much  of  human  thorns  and  thistles.  We  see 
that  wrong  abounds  on  every  side,  and  it  is  as 
inscrutable  to  us  as  it  is  that  death  should  lay 
its  icy  hand  upon  the  young,  or  that  the  pes- 
tilence should  walk  in  darkness  ;  or  that  the 
earthquake,  the  tornado,  or  the  fierce  light- 
nings, should  desolate  the  homes  of  men. 

We  believe  that  all  reformatory  effort,  to 
insure  success,  must  contain  the  elements  of 
a  broad  sympathy  and  a  tender  compassion 
for  those  whom  it  is  intended  to  benefit. 
This  is  the  secret  of  success  in  parental  gov- 
ernment, and  it  lies  at  the  basis  of  all  sub- 
stantial elevation  of  the  people  of  a  state  or 
nation. 

We  know  it  is  claimed  that  parents  are 
responsible  for  the  quality  of  character  of 
their  children.  To  some  extent  this  is  no 
doubt  true,  but  that  they  are  not  wholly  so 
is  as  true  as  that  they  are  not  entirely 
responsible  for  their  own  characters.  The 
best  of  parents,  often,  have  the  most  unruly 
children  ;  while  children  who  are  left  to  come 
up  as  best  they  may,  often  make  grand  and 


12  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

noble  men  and  women.  We  are  satisfied 
that  the  most  effective  of  all  parental  disci- 
pline is  the  loving  word  spoken  from  a  heart 
full  of  sympathy.  If  that  will  not  keep  the 
feet  of  the  erring  child  from  straying,  nothing 
else  will. 

Hence  we  conclude  that  in  the  exercise  of 
charity  and  brotherly  love  lies  the  hope  and 
salvation  of  the  race. 


BEGINNING-  TD  WALK, 


SEN  ought  to  grow  wiser  as  they  grow 
older.  Some  do.  Others  do  not.  All 
who  have  profited  by  the  garnered  experi- 
ences of  time — who  have  mingled  much  with, 
and  learned  the  ways  of,  the  world,  the 
flesh  and  the  devil,  and  of  the  church  also; 
and  who,  above  all,  are  actuated  by  that 
spirit  of  kindness  and  charity  that  should  pre- 
vail in  our  dealings  with  our  fellow  beings,— 
all  of  this  class  will  agree  with  us  that  a  blind 
and  unreasoning  opposition  to  the  estab- 


BEGINNING  TO  WALK.  13 

llshecl     religious    methods     for    the    world's 
redemption  is  not  wise. 

One  may  believe  all  systems  of  religion  to 
be  false — as  the  outgrowth  of  barbarism,  or  as 
founded  in  the  ignorance  and  superstition  of 
man's  undeveloped  nature, — and  yet  he  can 
not  intelligently  deny  that  there  is  a  necessity 
for  religious  restraint  over  the  minds  and 
actions  of  men — of  some  men,  of  many  men 
—not  all,  perhaps  ;  but  of  such  a  large  per- 
centage of  the  race  as  to  make  the  mainte- 
nance of  the  church,  in  its  varied  forms  of 
worship,  an  essential  if  not  the  main  prop  of 
society. 

It  may  be,  as  is  held  by  most  so-called 
free  thinkers,  that  if  all  religious  teaching  was 
supplemented  by  proper  instruction  in  the 
laws  of  health,  sobriety  and  right  living— 
that  if  science  was  made  to  take  the  place  of 
faith  and  revelation — better  general  results 
would  follow  than  are  now  witnessed.  This 
is  extremely  doubtful,  for  the  reason  that  the 
average  man  lacks  the  capacity  for  philosoph- 
ical application  of  the  truths  of  science.  The 
lessons  of  nature  and  the  laws  of  life  are 
nothing  to  him.  He  can  only  be  reached, 


14  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

and  that  often  indifferently,  through  his  fears  ; 
or  stimulated  to  right  action  through  his  hope 
of  reward.  It  is  with  this  somewhat  seriously 
damaged  article  of  humanity — the  average 
lot,  which  most  people  will  concede  is  a  bad 
lot — that  society  has  to  deal,  for  it  is  the 
lower  stratum  of  this  disagreeable  average 
that  causes  society  the  most  trouble. 

He  who  derides  all  church  influences  and 
religious  teachings  would  hardly  care  to  reside 
in  a  community  where  there  were  no  such 
influences  and  teachings — unless  he  was  per- 
mitted to  select  his  neighbors,  which  would 
scarcely  be  possible.  Churches  and  grog 
shops  may  exist  side  by  side  ;  and  yet  most 
persons  who  take  no  stock  in  either,  would 
rather  the  two  should  exist  together,  than  that 
the  grog  shops  should  have  it  all  to  them- 
selves. It  is  only  the  inconsiderate  and 
unreasoning  infidel — the  one  with  but  one 
idea,  and  that  badly  demoralized — who  would 
pull  down  the  churches  and  destroy  at  a  blow 
the  pious  faith  of  their  devout  membership. 

The  human  race  is  yet  in  its  infancy — is 
only  beginning  to  walk.  It  needs  all  the 
helps  and  encouragements  of  religion  as  well 


BEGINNING  TO  WALK.  15 

as  science  to  keep  it  from  stumbling  ;  and 
they  are  not  always  sufficient.  Although 
groping  amid  shadows  it  is  ever  reaching  out 
after  and  struggling  for  the  light.  And  it 
will  find  it  sometime — the  true  light — the 
electric  light  of  Wisdom.  The  law  of  eternal 
progress  is  graven  in  the  heart  of  the  rock, 
of  the  plant,  of  man.  All  life  is  barbed  with 
a  divine  purpose,  ever  penetrating  and  reach- 
ing forward,  holding  fast  to  that  which  it 
gains,  and  never  going  backwards, — that  is,  in 
its  entirety  and  ultimate. 

And  so  we  welcome  all  helps  to  growth, 
spiritual  or  intellectual — we  care  not  whence 
they  come — whether  from  saint  or  sinner, 
Jew  or  Gentile,  Pagan  or  Christian.  He  is 
our  brother  who  loves  his  fellow  men,  and 
would  do  unto  them  as  he  would  that  they 
should  do  unto  him — who  strives  by  word 
and  act  to  so  live  that  when  death  shall  have 
placed  its  icy  seal  upon  his  lips,  the  fragrance 
of  many  a  tender  memory  will  penetrate  the 
hearts  of  those  who  knew  him  best. 

TRULY  honest  minds  do  not  differ  as  widely 
as  they  are  apt  to  think  they  do. 


l6  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 


LEARN  TD   WAIT 


;IFE  has  many  puzzling  problems — many 
that  stagger  reason,  and  leave  the  mind 
lost  in  a  labyrinth  of  doubt.  We  can  not 
tell  why  it  is  that  wrong  is  permitted  to  exist 
in  the  world — that  the  innocent  should  suffer 
for  the  wickedness  of  others — that  nature,  in 
her  operations,  should  seemingly  be  so  inhar- 
monious and  make  so  many  blunders,— 
especially  while  we  have,  as  we  are  taught 
to  believe,  an  all- wise  and  infinitely  just  Ruler 
at  the  helm  of  the  Universe.  We  can  not 
understand  these  things.  No  one  can.  The 
least  we  can  do  is  to  wait  patiently  until  we 
can  obtain  clearer  views  of  life.  Sometime 
and  somewhere,  we  doubt  not,  we  shall  be 
able  to  take  in  at  a  glance  the  whole  long 
journey  of  life,  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave. 
Then  we  shall  see,  perhaps,  in  that  clearer 
light",  that  what  seemed  to  us  wrong  here  was 
so  only  in  seeming  ;  and  that  at  last,  and  in 
the  eternal  purposes  of  the  Infinite,  all  is  for 
the  best.  We  can  not  judge  of  the  year  by  a 


KNOW  THYSELF.  I  7 

single  day,  nor  of  a  human  life  by  a  single 
experience.  We  must  see  the  first  in  its 
completeness,  and  live  the  other  through  all 
of  its  experiences,  to  judge  correctly  of  either. 
Then  when  we  feel  it  in  our  hearts  to  com- 
plain or  rebel  at  our  lot — at  the  hard  con- 
ditions to  which  we  are  sometimes  subject — 
would  it  not  be  well  to  wait  a  little  while 
before  we  sum  up  the  case  and  conclude  that 
Nature  is  out  of  joint  ? 


"KNDT2Z  THYSELF, 


'NOW  thyself"  is  one  of  the  oldest 
maxims  of  the  race.  It  is  a  piece  of 
advice,  however,  that  but  very  few  people 
comparatively  ever  profit  by. 

Most  persons  have  only  a  sort  of  speaking 
acquaintance  with  themselves — as  though 
they  lived  next  door  neighbor,  or  across  the 
street.  They  never  come  into  full  and 
loving  sympathy  with  their  own  natures,  and 
hence  never  realize  of  what  treasures  of 


I  8  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

sweet  and  beautiful  companionship  they 
deprive  tliemselves. 

To  know  one's  self  thoroughly  requires 
much  more  patient  research  and  study  than 
most  people  would  imagine.  But  no  knowl- 
edge is  fraught  with  such  rich  rewards  to  its 
possessor — such  perfect  argosies  of  wisdom 
and  happiness. 

First  come  the  delights  of  that  physical 
knowledge  which  makes  us  familiar  with  the 
hidden  springs  and  secrets  of  life — with  the 
quality  and  functions  of  every  nerve,  organ 
and  muscle — with  all  the  wonderful  mechan- 
ism and  movements  of  the  "  house  we  live 
in."  But  this  knowledge  is  only  a  stepping- 
stone  to  those  higher  joys  that  come  of  inti- 
mate relationship  with,  and  keen  insight  into, 
the  character  of  that  mysterious  occupant  of 
this  earthly  temple,  the  living  soul. 

Here  is  indeed  a  vast  field  for  research — 
a  mighty  storehouse  of  treasure — or  trash, 
and  sometimes  both.  To  add  to  the  former, 
and  to  cast  out  and  displace  as  much  of  the 
useless  and  worthless  as  possible,  should  be 
every  one's  life  work. 

The    chief  aim    of  life  with  many  people 


KNOW  THYSELF.  19 

seems  to  be  to  devise  ways  and  means  for 
getting  away  from  themselves.  They  are 
miserable  when  alone,  and  are  only  reasonably 
contented  when  entertained  and  amused  by 
someone  else.  Such  people  may  be  very 
kind  hearted  and  very  good,  in  their  way,, 
but  they  are  often  terrible  vampires  to  their 
friends — absorbing  their  lives  and  giving 
nothing  in  return. 

A  well  stored  brain  never  tires  of  its  own 
company.  It  finds  food  for  thought  in  a 
thousand  things  whereof  the  superficial  mind 
would  take  no  note.  The  worn  pebble  by 
the  roadside  leads  it  back  asons  agone  to  the 
time  when  the  foundations  of  the  hills  were 
laid.  The  down  on  a  butterfly's  wing  opens 
up  to  it  a  wonderland  of  beauty  and  admira- 
tion. It  looks  out  into  the  starry  spaces,  and 
down  into  its  own  infinite  capacity  for  growth 
and  enjoyment,  and  it  can  find  no  time  nor 
place  in  all  God's  universe  for  loneliness. 

We  pity  the  man  or  woman  who  has  never 
made  the  acquaintance   of  him   or  herself— 
who   find  no  solid  enjoyment  in   the  fellow- 
ship   and    communion    of  their     own    souls. 
They   are   travelers   who   have   missed  their 


2O  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

way — miners  who  never  delve  beneath  the 
outcroppings  of  things,  and  know  nought  of 
the  priceless  wealth  stored  away  in  the  solid 
vein  below. 

In  the  great  battle  of  life  he  succeeds  best 
who  relies  most  upon  himself.  But  one 
must  be  on  most  intimate  terms  with  himself 
—must  know  well  the  scope  of  his  powers 
— the  strength  and  length  of  his  good 
right  arm, — or  the  blow  he  aims  at  the  foe 
may  fall  short  of  the  mark,  or  at  best  prove 
impotent  for  good. 

Not  but  that  association  has  its  grand  uses 
in  the  development  of  character — in  fact  is 
absolutely  necessary  to  the  proper  culture 
and  unfoldment  of  the  mind, — the  point  we 
would  make  is  that  solitude  and  meditation 
are  also  important  factors  in  the  growth  of 
the  soul  ;  and  that  one's  own  best  friend  and 
companion, — the  one  of  whose  society  he 
should  be  the  last  to  tire, — should  be — HIM- 
SELF. 

w  HE  gets  the  greatest  satisfaction,  often,  out 
of  life,  who  does  the  largest  amount  of 
attending  to  his  own  business. 


LIFE  R.  TRAINING-  SCHDEIL, 


is  a  good  thing  for  the  world  that  we  do 
not  all  think  or  act  alike  ;  and  that  all  do 
not  possess  the  same  amount  of  intelligence, 
wealth,  or  ability  to  wrestle  with  the  prob- 
lems of  life. 

We  are  too  apt  to  look  upon  this  life  as  the 
end  of  existence,  rather  than  as  the  means  to 
higher  uses  and  ends  to  be  employed  and  en- 
joyed in  the  hereafter.  As  an  end  we  would 
naturally  look  for  and  desire  completeness  ; 
whereas,  as  a  schooling  and  experience  neces- 
sary to  proper  soul  growth — as  all-essential 
to  the  building  up  and  rounding  out  of 
character— as  a  training  school  preparatory 
for  the  life  and  work  BEYOND — we  apprehend 
it  is  just  about  as  it  should  be. 

If  all  were  good,  there  would  be  no  oppor- 
tunity for  missionary  work — no  need  of 
Churches,  nor  Sunday  Schools,  nor  Young 
Men's  Christian  Associations.  If  all  were 
rich,  well-fed  and  contented,  there  would  be 
no  opportunity  for  the  exercise  of  charity — no 


22  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

one  to  do  the  work  of  the  world — nothing  to 
stimulate  effort  and  enterprise.  If  there  were 
no  sickness,  suffering  nor  sorrow  in  the  world, 
there  would  be  nothing  to  call  forth  the  tender 
sympathies  of  humanity.  In  fact,  if  there 
were  no  storms  nor  tempests  of  the  soul  we 
should  never  know  how  to  appreciate  the 
restful  calm  and  sunshine — the  joy  that  comes 
of  gentle  peace. 

Hence,  while  the  philanthropist,  Christian 
and  philosopher,  are  constantly  studying 
methods  for  the  amelioration  of  the  condition 
of  the  race,  and  the  advancement  of  humanity, 
'the  necessity  for  such  work  is  as  essential  to 
the  doer  as  it  is  to  those  who  are  done  by. 
Sin  and  salvation,  sickness  and  health,  plenty 
and  poverty,  storm  and  sunshine,  crime, 
cruelty,  insanity  and  wrong ;  life,  growth, 
death  and  decay, — are  all  important  factors  in 
die  development  of  character  and  the  true 
growth  of  the  soul.  He  who  fails  to  profit  by 
these  lessons,  wastes  the  golden  opportunity 
of  his  days.  He  is  a  laggard  and  a  truant  in 
the  primary  school  of  life — an  encumberer  of 
the  ground — profitless  seed  cast  by  the  way- 
side. 


LIFE  A  TRAINING  SCHOOL.  23 

This  view  of  life  is  necessary  to  reconcile 
us  to  an  endurance  of  life's  ills.  It  teaches 
us  to  take  things  as  we  find  them  and  make 
the  best  of  them — to  stop  quarreling  with  our 
surroundings,  and  mourning  over  what  can 
not  be  helped  ;  but  rather  to  set  ourselves 
diligently  at  work  to  improving  the  conditions 
and  circumstances  in  which  we  are  involved. 
If  there  are  brambles  and  rocks  in  our  path- 
way, instead  of  sitting  down  placidly  and 
deploring  the  fact,  we  should  realize  the 
necessity  for  greater  personal  efforts  in  making 
the  way  smoother  for  those  who  may  follow  ; 
and  with  ready  heart  and  hand  we  should 
lend  ourselves  to  the  work. 

So  will  life  become  sweeter  from  duty 
performed,  and  we  shall  mount  heavenward 
as  we  grow  into  the  image  of  a  better  man- 
hood. 

THE  man  who  demands  a  single  civil, 
social,  or  political  privilege  for  himself  that 
he  would  not  accord  to  his  wife,  mother, 
sister  or  daughter,  possesses  the  rudimentary 
principles  of  a  tyrant,  although  he  may  not 
think  so. 


24  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

HUMAN   SYMPATHY, 


IK^N  the  struggle  and  battle  of  life  there  is  no 
Sii  one  strong  enough  to  brave  the  contest 
alone.  All  need  sympathy  and  help,  and 
they  must  have  it,  or  sure  disaster  and 
defeat  will  overtake  them. 

He  who  thinks  himself  strongest,  when 
his  life  bark  rides  gaily  before  the  breeze, 
with  sails  filled  with  the  winds  of  prosperity, 
is  often  the  weakest  of  the  weak  when  the 
storm  and  the  tempest  come.  Thus  in  the 
hour  of  sorest  trial  many  a  weak  woman  has 
often  been  strong  and  brave  to  endure,  where 
stalwart  manhood  has  succumbed  and 
drifted  helpless  and  discouraged  before  the 
the  gale  of  adversity. 

Life  is  sweetened  and  made  beautiful  by 
sympathy.  Its  asperities  are  toned  down 
and  its  rough  places  made  smooth  by  the 
touch  of  a  gentle  hand  and  the  tone  of  a 
loving  voice.  Even  its  severest  trials  may 
be  endured  and  its  heaviest  burdens  borne, 
when  aided  by  a  very  little  thoughtful  and 
precious  help  of  this  kind. 


HUMAN  SYMPATHY.  2 5 

Suffering  seems  to  be  the  common  lot  of 
all  keen  natures.  The  finer  and  more  deli- 
cately strung  the  instrument  the  greater  the 
liability  to  get  out  of  tune,  and  when  out  of 
tune  the  harsher  the  discords. 

Some  people  'are  so  evenly  organized  in 
their  natures  that  scarcely  any  amount  of 
trouble  worries  them.  Their  lives  flow  on 
smoothly  and  serenely,  but  never  deeply. 
As  they  are  incapable  of  great  sorrow,  so 
also  are  they  dull  to  the  rapture  of  great  joy. 
Emotionless  souls — calmly  placid  natures, — 
in  the  wonderful  unfoldments  of  human  life, 
though  they  may  be  the  wiser  and  happier, 
yet  they  can  never  be  great  natures.  They 
approximate  too  nearly  the  dull  and  insensate 
conditions  of  life  that  belong  to  the  earlier 
and  lower  developments  of  the  race. 

It  is  only-  the  most  intense  natures  that 
live  most — that  get  out  of  life  its  grandest,  if 
not  best  results — its  highest  happiness,^  al- 
though not  unmixed,  often,  with  its  keenest 
agonies.  In  order  to  fully  and  truly  ap- 
preciate heaven  it  is  necessary  to  know  what 
hell  is  made  of. 

All  genius,  whether  in  art  or  letters,  belongs 


26  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

to  this  intense  class.  In  the  sanctum,  forum, 
pulpit, — in  poetry,  painting,  sculpture,  song, 
—in  all  the  higher  ways  of  mentality,— 
though  often  erratic,  and  sometimes  weak  in 
certain  elements  of  character,  they  neverthe- 
less constitute  the  lightning  strikers  of  the 
world.  They  are  the  men  and  women  who 
mould  public  tastes,  and  shape  the  plastic 
thought  of  humanity  into  beautiful  shapes. 
They  often  lead  where  they  do  not  walk,  and 
point  out  shining  ways  for  other  feet  than 
their  own  to  tread  ;  but  they  are  none  the 
less  great  in  those  attributes  of  soul  and 
character  that  make  them  the  heroes,  instruct- 
ors and  saviors  of  the  race. 

Such  natures  are  but  little  understood  by 
the  great  multitude,  and  they  never  can  be 
fully  understood  in  this  life.  Perhaps  they 
will  be  better  known  and  appreciated  in  the 
Beyond,  when  the  masks  and  rubbish  of  earth 
shall  be  left  behind,  and  the  pure  gem  of  soul 
shall  find  a  better  setting. 

Why  it  is  that  from  souls  capable  of  these 
great  conflicts — of  struggles  in  fathomless 
depths  of  sorrow  and  transports  on  mountain 
heights  of  gladness — are  mainly  evolved  the 


MODEST  DOUBTERS.  2  7 

highest  fruitions  of  heart  and  brain,  is  some- 
thing we  can  not  understand.  We  must 
wait  till  the  veil  shall  be  rent  asunder,  and 
then  we  shall  see  and  know — perhaps. 

MDDEST  DOUBTERS, 


|j|O  the  materialist  the  physical  world  is 
the  all  in  all  of  the  universe.  He  sees 
reality  only  in  those  coarser  forms  of  matter 
that  appeal  to  the  physical  senses.  In  fact 
he  denies  the  existence  of  any  and  every- 
thing that  his  senses  can  not  grasp,  forgetting 
that  there  may  be  keener  senses  than  those 
of  his  own  organism.  We  use  the  term 
"  coarser  forms  of  matter,"  because  to  the 
undeveloped  mind,  those  are  the  only  forms 
that  impinge  upon  the  senses.  But  science 
is  constantly  unfolding  new  and  imponderable 
forms  of  which  the  senses  take  no  note. 
Traversing  the  field  of  matter  it  enters  a  new 
and  unexplored  domain  which  seemingly  lies 
outside  the  boundaries  of  matter.  And  here 


28  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

in  a  maze  of  subtile  forces  and  forms,  the 
unfolded  mind  is  lost  in  wonder  and  rev- 
erence. 

It  is  not  our  purpose  to  attempt  to  clear  up 
the  mists  that  hover  over  the  border  land  of 
the  physical.  We  desire  merely  to  suggest 
that  we  can  know  but  very  little  of  the  matter 
at  best.  In  the  aggregation  of  atoms  of 
which  our  densest  solids  are  formed  there  is 
in  reality  no  permanence  or  solidity.  In  the 
crucible — under  the  action  of  other  elements 
— these  solids  disappear  in  impalpable  vapor, 
or  enter  into  new  forms.  By  an  expansion 
of  its  internal  heat,  or  that  of  the  central  orb 
around  which  it  revolves,  the  ponderable 
globe  itself  might  be  resolved  into  the  vapor- 
ous nebula  whence  it  sprung.  So,  may  it 
not  be  that  what  we  call  matter  is  the  mere 
expression  of  force  ;  or  rather  force  taking- 
upon  itself  tangible  shape  ?  That  the  things 
which  seem  to  us  the  most  tangible  and  real 
are  in  fact  the  most  evanescent  and  unreal  ; 
while  the  unchanging  and  everlasting  belong 
exclusively  to  the  domain  of  the  imponder- 
able ;  or  as  we  prefer  the  term,  the  spiritual  ? 

Therefore    we    should    be    modest   in   our 


MODEST  DOUBTERS.  29 

denial  or  rejection  of  what  we  do  not  know  to 
be  true.  There  is  very  little,  comparatively, 
that  we  can  know  of  anything  save  the 
simplest  rudiments.  Whoever  dogmatically 
asserts  that  a  thing  is  not  so,  because  he 
does  not  know  it  to  be  so,  simply  advertises 
his  ignorance  to  the  world.  And]  nowhere 
among  men  is  this  dogmatism  more  pro- 
nounced than  among  a  certain  class  of  minis- 
ters of  the  Gospel,  who,  while  they  claim  to 
believe  in  the  intelligent  existence  of  the 
spirit  of  man  after  death,  nevertheless  deny 
all  of  the  alleged  phenomena  relating  thereto 
—phenomena  to  the  reality  of  which  many  of 
the  most  eminent  scientists  the  world  has 
ever  produced  have  borne  and  do  now  bear 
witness. 

The  best  and  clearest  thinkers  are  never 
dogmatic.  They  assert  only  after  the  most 
thorough  investigation  and  irrefragible  proof  ; 
and  they  always  deny  cautiously.  They 
take  nothing  for  granted  that  does  not  have 
the  approval  of  reason.  Whoever  abandons 
reason  casts  overboard  his  compass  and  chart. 
True,  the  former  may  be  deflected  by  natural 
bias,  by  false  education,  by  various  causes  ; 


30  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

and  the  latter  may  fail  to  indicate  many  a 
sunken  reef  and  dangerous  whirlpool,  yet 
they  are  the  best  and  really  only  guides  we 
have — unless  we  choose  to  surrender  all  indi- 
viduality and  become  puppets  and  pliant 
putty  in  the  hands  of  other  minds.  It  is 
better  to  walk  and  stumble  than  not  to  walk 
at  all. 

The  mind  once  awakened  to  the  con- 
sciousness of  the  fact  that  this  life  is  not  the 
all  of  existence  ;  that  it  is  merely  a  primary 
school  to  a  higher  grade  beyond  ;  this  con- 
clusion reached,  not  as  a  matter  of  faith, 
which  is  often  unreasoning  and  blind,  but  of 
absolute  knowledge,  and  life  has  a  new 
meaning,  beauty  and  grandeur,  of  which  the 
cold  materialist  never  dreamed.  The  soul, 
hungry  for  spiritual  food,  demands  of  the 
ministers  of  religion  of  every  faith  this 
knowledge,  the  absolute  proof  of  the  soul's 
immortality.  It  will  not  be  put  aside  with  an 
evasive  answer.  It  says,  Give  us  the  proof 
or  stop  preaching  the  doctrine  ; — or  at  least 
stop  denying  the  claim  of  those  who  think 
they  know  that  "  if  a  man  die  he  shall  live 
again." 


THE  LDG-IC  DF  POVERTY, 


JUT  few  people  comparatively  are  "born 
to  the  purple."  And  it  is  a  serious 
question  whether  those  who  are  thus  born, 
and  are  thereby  relieved  from  a  large 
measure  of  the  cares  and  anxieties  common 
to  the  world's  toilers,  are  any  better  off 
therefor.  The  faculties  of  our  natures  that 
are  not  brought  into  constant  and  active  play 
become  limp  and  ineffective  from  disuse. 
Thus  the  man  born  to  an  inheritance  of 
plenty  misses  all  of  those  grand  lessons  of 
self-denial,  and  necessity  for  patient  and 
persistent  industry,  that  can  be  learned  only 
in  the  schools  of  Adversity  and  Poverty. 
He  misses  the  schooling  of  those  hard 
struggles  with  the  perplexing  problems  of 
existence,  so  necessary  to  harden  his  mus- 
cles, moral  as  well  as  physical,  and  bring  out 
the  best  that  is  within  him. 

It  is  natural  for  the  poor  to  envy  the  lot 
of  the  rich — especially  of  those  who  live  in 
luxurious  ease,  and  who,  in  the  words  of 


32  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

Scripture,  "toil  not,  neither  do  they  spin,"- 
the  world's  inutilities — the  pampered  de- 
scendants of  sires  who,  in  all  their  busy  lives, 
knew  no  rest  nor  peace  of  mind  in  the  mad 
acquisition  of  wealth,  which  did  them  but 
little  if  any  good,  and  their  descendants 
positive  evil.  If  the  poor  only  knew  it,  they 
are  better  off  as  they  are  ;  that  is,  so  long  as 
they  are  prompted  to  struggle  for  something 
beyond  their  present  lot,  and  are  reasonably 
happy  even  though  they  fail  to  reach  it. 
The  struggle  for  it,  is  the  main  thing  needed 
—it  keeps  the  metal  bright,  and  the  faculties 
in  tune.  No  one  can  afford  to  go  through 
life  without  experiencing  the  necessity  for 
calling  into  constant  and  vigorous  action  all 
his  mental  powers.  Where  the  necessity  is 
wanting  the  faculty  will  be  apt  to  lie  dormant. 
The  hardest  worked  men  in  any  commu- 
nity are  those  who  devote  their  lives  solely 
to  the  acquisition  of  wealth.  By  constant 
practice  and  application  they  succeed  in 
developing  the  acquisitive  faculty  to  an 
abnormal  extent,  at  the  price  often  of  all  the 
nobler  attributes  of  the  soul.  Such  lives  are 
usually  empty  of  sunshine.  They  are  beyond 


THE   LOGIC  OF  POVERTY.  33 

the  pale  of  human  sympathy, — are  desolate 
and  unloved  in  the  midst  of  plenty.  True 
growth  is  even  growth — growth  in  all  noble 
directions.  Large  acquisitiveness  should  be 
accompanied  with  large  charity,  large  man- 
liness of  character.  And  yet  the  develop- 
ment of  these  traits  of  character  seldom  go 
hand  in  hand.  The  race  of  Howards  and 
Peabodys  is  not  so  numerous  as  to  be  over- 
crowded. 

Probably  the  worst  condition  of  mind  in 
which  a  man  can  find  himself  is  that  of  being 
contented  and  satisfied  with  but  little  or 
nothing.  This  is  the  other  extreme  of  life. 
It  is  to  be  practically  worthless  to  himself  and 
to  the  world.  Only  those  succeed  in  doing 
who  try  to  do.  Infinitely  better  to  try  and 
fail  than  not  to  try  at  all.  To  float  with  the 
stream  is  the  easiest  thing  in  the  world  ; — to 
stem  and  overcome  it,  and  rise  superior  to  it, 
ah,  that  takes  nerve  and  manhood.  And 
here  is  where  nature  draws  the  line  between 
the  good  and  the  good-for-nothing. 

We  should  aim  to  be  satisfied  only  with 
what  we  can  not  help  or  improve.  And 
there  is  but  very  little  with  which  we  come  in 


34  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

contact,  in  our  surroundings  and  circum- 
stances, that  we  can  not  improve,  if  we  have 
the  will  to  set  ourselves  about  it.  If  we  lack 
the  will,  the  sooner  we  cease  to  encumber 
the  earth,  the  better  for  the  earth. 


KEEP  DUT  DF  THE  RUTS, 


you  would  make  rapid  progress  in  the 
direction  of  truth  keep  out  of  the  ruts. 

We  need  to  revise  our  opinions  occasion- 
ally— politically,  socially,  religiously,  and 
otherwise, — just  as  we  need,  from  time  to 
time,  to  reset  our  watches,  or  adjust  the 
variation  of  our  magnetic  needles. 

We  form  our  conclusions  upon  any  given 
subject  from  the  evidence  before  us  at  the 
time.  We  may  not  always  be  in  possession  of 
all  the  facts  in  the  case.  We  may  find  that  we 
have  placed  too  much  stress  upon  this  point 
and  not  given  that  sufficient  importance. 
Hence,  we  are  liable  to  err,  even  the  wisest 
of  us  ;  and  we  notice  that  those  generally  err 
the  most  who  think  they  err  the  least. 


KEEP  OUT  OF  THE  RUTS.  35 

It  is  this  natural  and  inevitable  tendency  to 
imperfection  and  incompleteness  of  judgment 
that  prompts  the  truly  wise  man  to  be 
extremely  cautious  in  his  assertions  of  fact — 
that  induces  him  to  hold  the  case  open  till 
the  testimony  is  all  in.  And  in  whatever 
relates  to  the  unknowable,  or  purely  specula- 
tive, it  is  never  all  in,  and  no  finality  can  be 
reached  in  this  life. 

The  man  who  never  changes  his  opinions 
is  apt  to  be  more  stubborn  than  wise.  In 
time  he  gravitates  into  a  sort  of  mental 
groove  or  rut  and  becomes  bigoted  and 
dogmatic.  He  is  in  the  position  of  a  judge 
who  closes  the  case  on  trial  before  him 
before  the  evidence  is  all  in,  and  jumps  at  a 
conclusion  that  may  not  be  warranted  by  the 
ultimate  facts. 

Of  course,  there  are  demonstrable  facts 
concerning  which  the  case  may  be  considered 
closed — such  as  the  facts  of  nature  and  of 
science  that  have  long  since  ceased  to  be 
regarded  as  theories.  Our  conclusions  on 
these  points  may  be  regarded  as  completed 
—as  needing  no  further  revision, — and  they 
may  be  properly  labeled  and  packed  away  in 


36  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

the  storehouse  of  the  brain.  It  is  not  about 
these  facts  that  men  are  apt  to  differ  greatly, 
for  the  means  are  always  at  hand  to  prove  the 
correctness  of  their  opinions.  It  is  the  long1 
array  of  unprovable  things  concerning  which 
they  wrangle,  and  pull  hair,  and  call  each 
other  hard  names. 

The  time  was  when  to  doubt  was  to  be 
socially  and  eternally  damned — when  to  be  a 
skeptic  was  to  subject  oneself  to  the  pains  of 
the  rack  and  thumbscrew.  In  the  better 
light  of  an  advancing  civilization  that  mode  of 
enforcing  belief  was  supplemented  by  milder, 
but  no  less  objectionable  methods — social 
ostracism — which,  to  a  sensitive  mind,  is 
often  less  endurable  than  physical  torture. 

It  takes  a  brave  heart  and  resolute  will  to 
stem  the  popular  current,  when  the  multitude 
say,  "  Crucify  him."  But  in  all  ages  such 
there  have  been,  and  to  them  we  are  indebted 
for  the  liberty  of  opinion  we  enjoy  -to-day. 

Honest  skepticism  no  longer  subjects  one 
to  the  rack,  in  any  sense.  The  conscientious 
doubter  can  walk  erect  among,  and  command 
the  respect  of  his  fellows— even  of  those  who 
think,  or  think  they  think,  that  he  will  have  a 


KEEP  OUT  OF  THE  RUTS.  37 

place  among  the  eternally  lost  in  the  life  to 
come. 

Our  best  enlightened  religious  teachers 
are  no  longer  offensively  dogmatic  in  the 
presence  of  intelligent  unbelief.  And  the 
latter  is  inclined  to  be  modestly  unobtrusive, 
except  when  aroused.  We  are  learning  to  be 
more  respectful  towards  each  other — more 
considerate  of  each  other's  tender  spots. 
And  this  is  as  it  should  be.  It  enables  us  to 
get  along  much  more  harmoniously  than  we 
otherwise  could.  It  Is  a  sort  of  moral  lubri- 
cating oil,  making  less  friction  in  the  attrition 
of  ideas. 

And  all  this  comes  of  the  liberalizing 
influence  of  modern  things,  and  of  our 
improved  modes  of  thought.  We  are  living 
in  an  age  and  times  when  thoughtful  men 
have  something  else  to  think  of  than  the 
speculative  problem  of  existence  beyond  the 
boundaries  of  time.  They  realize  the  import- 
ance of  a  better  order  of  NOW,  and  find  too 
much  to  do  in  the  ever  pressing  needs  of  the 
present,  and  in  the  common  battle  of  life,  to 
waste  too  much  force  and  substance  on  what 
may  interest  us  more,  perhaps,  by-and-by. 


38  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

SOMEWHERE 


RED  hearts  that  go  life's  ragged  ways  alone, 
Somewhere,  in  God's  vast  universe  of  soul, 
In  realms  of  light,  where  law  and  love  control, 
Each  one  shall  find  its  own, 
Somewhere. 

O,  think  not  this  the  all  of  life,  below. — 
Its  cares  and  burdens,  agonies  and  tears, 
That  weigh  the  soul  through  many  weary  years, 

Full  recompense  shall  know, 
Somewhere. 

Nature  with  all  her  children  fairly  deals. 

All  time  is  hers,  and  boundless  realms  of  space, 
And  endless  means,  and  ways  we  may  not  trace, 

Her  purpose  she  reveals 
Somewhere. 

We  may  not  see  the  justice  of  her  ways, 

Nor  know  why  wrong  prevails,  or  sin  endures, 
Nor  why  to  evil  deeds  the  tempter  lures. 

The  very  doubts  we  raise, 
Somewhere 

Will  turn  to  golden  fruit  ;  our  pray'rs  and  tears 
Shall  blossom  into  joys,  whose  fragrance  sweet 
Shall  make  the  fullness  of  our  lives  complete, 

And  banish  all  our  fears, 
Somewhere. 


FREEMASONRY  OF  BRAINS.  39 

If  this  were  all,  and  death  the  final  goal, 
And  all  outreaching  aspiration  dies, 
When  'neath  the  clod  the  mortal  casket  lies, 

And  dwelleth  not  the  soul 
Somewhere  — 

Then  were  Nature's  purposes  in  man 
Exceptional  to  all  her  perfect  ends  : 

j—    Our  very  being's  incompleteness  lends 


Somewhere. 


FREEMASONRY  DF  ERAINS, 


is  related  of  those  sweet,  white-souled 
sisters,  Alice  and  Phoebe  Gary,  that  their 
pretty,  modest  home  was  the  frequent  resort 
of  many  of  the  literati  of  New  York  City. 
Horace  Greeley,  Park  Benjamin,  Bayard 
Taylor,  and  other  famous  men  of  letters, 
often  met  at  their  cosy  little  tea  parties  ; 
and  we  can  well  imagine  the  "  flow  of 
soul,"  the  brilliant  conversations,  the  spark- 
ling wit,  the  interchange  of  noble  thought, 
and  the  flashing  emanations  of  genius,  that 
must  have  made  those  meetings  occasions  of 
rare  delight  to  each  and  all. 


40  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

Thus  we  find  among  cultured  people  gen 
erally,  in  their  social  relations,  a  larger  free- 
dom from  conventional  restraint,  and  a  more 
profound  contempt  for  the  opinions  of  "  Mrs. 
Grundy,"  than  among  those  of  shallower 
intellectual  depths.  They  constitute  a  sort 
of  Freemasonry  of  brains,  a  Guild  of  Soul, 
the  shibboleth  to  which  can  only  be  spoken 
with  proper  accent  by  those  born  to  the 
purple.  Conscious  of  the  rectitude  of  their 
lives  and  the  genuineness  of  their  characters,, 
they  do  not  trouble  themselves  much  about 
their  reputations,  for  that  they  know  often 
consists  only  of  the  breath  of  fools.  Faithful 
to  the  divinity  within  their  own  souls,  they 
recognize  the  pure  gold  of  character  and  the 
right  royal  stamp  of  intellectual  and  spiritual 
worth  wherever  they  find  them  ;  and,  if  at 
all,  they  naturally  seek  for  the  friendship  and 
companionship  of  their  kind.  Thus  they  are 
apt  to  be  misunderstood  by  the  thoughtless 
and  superficial,  especially  when  these  pure 
intellectual  friendships  exist  between  those  of 
opposite  sexes  outside  the  marital  relations. 
As  though  intelligent  people  could  not  with 
propriety  enjoy  such  friendships,  and  the 


CONTENTMENT.  4! 

refining  attrition  of  mind  with  mind  which 
follow  therefrom,  without  subjecting  them- 
selves to  the  censure  of  that  prurient  prude 
that  sometimes  goes  by  the  name  of  Society. 
When  will  the  world  learn  that  the  mind  is 
sexless — that  genius  is  a  thing  of  the 
immortal  spirit — that  in  the  higher  life  of 
the  soul  there  is  "  no  marriage  nor  giving  in 
marriage." 


CONTENTMENT, 


|NE  of  the  chief  studies  of  mankind  in  all 
ages  has  been  how  to  obtain  the  most 
for  the  least, — in  other  words,  how  to  get 
the  most  money  for  the  least  labor  ;  and  the 
largest  measure  of  happiness  for  the  smallest 
amount  of  effort.  This  is  a  right  principle  ; 
provided,  that  in  getting  the  most  we  do  not 
trespass  on  the  rights  of  the  least ;  and  pro- 
vided further,  we  make  the  right  use  of  what 
we  get.  Upon  these  two  points  hinge  all  the 
equities  and  virtues  of  the  accumulation  of 
wealth. 


42  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

One  source  of  almost  unlimited  trouble  in 
this  world  is  in  not  knowing  when  we  are 
well  off.  Our  happiness  depends  too  much 
on  what  we  suppose  others  may  think  of  us, 
and  too  little  on  what  we  really  think  of 
ourselves.  We  carry  the  spirit  of  rivalry 
and  emulation  to  an  extreme.  In  our  efforts 
to  excel  our  neighbors  we  often  overdo  the 
business  and  make  ourselves  miserable. 

Where  is  the  early  pioneer  of  any  new 
country  who  will  not  tell  you  in  his  old  age 
that  life  was  sweeter  to  him,  and  his  happi- 
ness more  complete,  away  back  in  his  log 
cabin  days,  when  his  neighbors,  like  himself, 
were  all  poor  and  struggling  with  the  wilder- 
ness for  the  bare  necessaries  of  life,  than  in 
his  later  years,  in  his  palatial  home,  with  his 
body  Brussels,  French  cooks,  bay  windows, 
servants,  rheumatism,  pianos,  and  fashionable 
grown  up  daughters.  Not  but  that  a  beauti- 
ful home  with  pleasant  surroundings  is  of 
itself  a  source  of  pleasure  to  any  refined 
nature  ;  but  to  be  conducive  of  true  happiness 
to  the  possessor  it  must  be  the  natural  out- 
growth of  culture  and  refinement,  rather  than 
the  creation  of  blind  wealth  to  gratify  a  mean 


CONTENTMENT.  43 

spirit  of  rivalry  or  selfish  vanity.  It  is  the 
insatiate  longing-  to  excel — not  in  the  gentle 
virtues  of  humanity,  nor  in  the  rich  treasures 
of  knowledge,  but  in  mere  temporal  things 
that  perish  in  a  day- — that  plays  the  mischief 
with  modern  society. 

There  was  a  time  in  the  not  distant  past 
when  fortunes,  except  in  rare  instances,  were 
acquired  only  by  a  lifetime  of  arduous  and 
persistent  struggle  in  some  of  the  great  indus- 
tries of  the  world.  Now,  by  the  rise  and 
fall  of  stocks  fortunes  come  and-  o-o  with  the 

o 

tide,  leaving  wrecks  of  humanity  thickly 
strewn  along  the  shores  of  time — for  men 
are  as  often  wrecked  with  riches  as  with  their 
loss.  Hence,  it  is  no  particular  virtus,  or 
even  evidence  of  peculiar  acquisitive  skill,  in 
these,  days,  to  acquire  wealth.  Many  of  our 
rich  men  are  monuments  of  meanness  and 
moral  obloquy.  They  live  by  driving  hard 
bargains,  by  grinding  two  per  cent  a  month 
out  of  poor  men,  and  foreclosing  mortgages 
on  the  homesteads  of  widows.  There  is  no 
more  milk  of  human  kindness  in  their  natures 
than  there  is  fragrance  in  a  toadstool.  The 
joy  of  helping  others  is  a  sensation  they 


44  °UR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

never  knew.  Their  hearts  are  a  nest  of 
spiders  eternally  on  the  search  for  flies, 
They  pile  up  riches,  and  their  avarice  grows 
upon  what  it  feeds,  until  each  avenue  of 
their  souls  becomes  the  hungry  mouth  of  a 
cuttle  fish,  sucking  and  absorbing  from  every- 
thing with  which  it  comes  in  contact.  When 
such  men  die  it  is  a  good  thing  for  the  world 
— perhaps.  What  such  souls  can  find  to  do 
in  the  Land  of  Souls, — if  there  be  any  such 
place, — is  something  that  no  man  can  find 
out. 

How  much  better  for  all  if  all  were  better 
content  with  their  lot,  and  learned  to  cease 
envying  the  fancied  happiness  and  enjoyment 
of  others.  The  flowers  that  blossom  in  our 
neighbor's  garden — their  fragrance  and  beauty 
are  as  much  for  us  as  for  their  owner.  We 
have  a  fee  simple  in  just  as  much  sunshine 
and  air  as  he.  We  own  just  as  large  a  patch 
of  God's  blue  sky — can  number  among  our 
jewels  just  as  many  stars  as  our  more  wealthy 
neighbor.  Yes,  infinitely  more  than  he,  for 
we  are  less  encumbered  with  those  worldly 
cares  that  obscure  the  glorious  vision  of  the 
soul,  and  shut  out  the  heaven  that  unfolds  its 


UNSOLVED  PROBLEMS.  45 

broad    expanse    all    around    the  humblest  of 
earth's   children. 


UNSOLVED    PROBLEMS 


^OCIETY  has  to  deal  with  many  unpleas- 
ant facts — facts  of  pauperism,  hoodlum- 
ism,  intemperance,  insanity,  theft,  murder,  un- 
faithfulness in  office,  marital  inharmony, 
and  unbounded  rascality  of  all  kinds.  These 
are  facts  which  no  amount  of  preaching,  or 
legislation,  or  civil  restraint,  seems  potent 
enough  to  avert,  or  even  to  modify.  They 
exist  everywhere  to  curse  the  better  portions 
of  the  race,  and  fill  the  world  with  inharmony 
and  tears.  What  to  do  with  all  of  this  diseased 
and  disordered  humanity — how  to  lick  it  into 
healthy  and  pleasant  shapes — has  been  the 
puzzle  of  the  ages.  It  is  a  problem  that  may 
well  stagger  the  social  scientist  and  philo- 
sopher of  all  times  and  climes. 

This  disagreeable  fact  is  one  that  there  is 
no  sort  of  use  in  scolding  about  ;  we  must 
meet  it,  with  all  its  unpleasant  consequences, 


46  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

and  we  may  as  well  be  good  natured  about 
it  as  otherwise.  It  piles  up  huge  burdens  of 
taxes  against  the  industrious  and  thrifty 
classes,  which  they  may  as  well  pay  cheer- 
fully as  grudgingly  ;  for  fretting  will  not 
mend  the  matter,  but  rather  sour  the  dis- 
position and  impair  the  digestion.  We  can't 
kill  off  these  excrescences;  law  and  human- 
ity would  not  permit  of  it  ;  and  so  we  do 
what  we  consider  the  next  best  thing  ;  that 
is,  we  maintain  an  expensive  judicial  system, 
and  build  vast  court  houses,  asylums  and 
prisons  for  their  punishment  and  confinement, 
and  for  our  own  protection.  But  this  works 
no  cure  of  the  evil.  It  simply  lops  off  some 
of  the  branches  without  removing  the  roots, 
and  two  new  shoots  spring  forth  where  one 
existed  before. 

We  unhesitatingly  assert,  and  challenge 
successful  contradiction,  that  modern  society, 
with  its  innovations  in  the  matter  of  labor 
saving  machinery,  with  its  speculating  ten- 
dencies, with  its  legislation  favoring  the 
accumulation  of  vast  wealth  in  the  hands 
of  the  greedy  and  strongly  acquisitive  few,  is 
pauperizing  and  criminalizing  the  race  at  a 


UNSOLVED  PROBLEMS.  47 

rate  unprecedented  in  the  history  of  the 
world.  Under  this  condition  of  things  only 
the  few  can  succeed,  and  the  many,  or  a 
large  and  less  acquisitively  constituted  por- 
tion thereof,  must  necessarily  starve,  steal  or 
die.  To  tell  the  poor  man,  without  a  dollar 
in  the  world,  and  perhaps  without  the  faculty 
for  acquiring  a  dollar  beyond  his  daily  or 
immediate  needs,  that  there  are  unoccupied 
government  lands  in  Texas,  Arizona  or 
Montana,  inviting  him  to  emigrate  thither, 
is  of  about  as  much  use  as  to  assure  him 
that  there  are  good  farming  lands  in  the 
planet  Saturn  that  he  can  have  for  the  ask- 
ing. What  the  average  poor  man  wants  is 
work  for  wages.  Deprived  of  this  he  be- 
comes an  outcast,  a  tramp,  and  perhaps  a 
criminal.  It  is  the  duty  of  society  to  furnish 
him  with  employment—  not  employment  for 
to-day  and  none  for  to-morrow  ;  but  steady 
labor,  at  such  remunerative  wages  as  shall 
provide  him  with  wholesome  food,  comfort- 
able clothing  and  proper  shelter,  But  how 
can  society  do  this  with  muscle  everywhere 
supplemented  by  machinery  ?  The  question 
is  much  more  easily  asked  than  answered. 


48  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

We  have  reached  an  era  in  our  civilization 
that  is  new  and  startling — one  that  the  politi- 
cal or  social  economist  of  even  a  quarter  of  a 
century  ago  never  dreamed  of.  He  never 
dreamed  that  the  time  would  come  in  the 
history  of  our  nation  and  race  when  brawn 
and  sinew  would  be  the  drug  in  the  market 
that  they  are  to-day.  He  never  imagined 
that  any  element  could  so  derange  the  ad- 
justment of  labor  to  bread,  as  that  we  witness 
to-day  as  the  outcome  of  the  uses  of  ma- 
chinery in  the  industrial  affairs  of  the  world. 
The  question  to  him  is  as  new  as  it  is  mo- 
mentous. It  is  one  full  of  danger  to  society 
and  the  commonwealth. 

With  these  facts  before  us  what  is  the 
duty  of  the  hour  ?  In  the  first  place  the 
condition  of  the  unemployed  classes  calls  for 
the  exercise  of  a  broad  spirit  of  charity  and 
humanity  on  the  part  of  the  affluent.  It 
should  suggest  to  the  latter  that  there  is 
danger  in  the  parsimony  that  permits  of 
large  numbers  of  idle  men  in  the  community. 
They  should  not  only,  in  a  private  capacity, 
endeavor  to  furnish  employment  to  the  unem- 
ployed, but  they  should  consent  to  the 


MISUNDERSTOOD.  49 

inauguration    of  public  enterprises   requiring 
many  laborers. 

And    yet   all  these   are   but   make-shifts— 
temporary    expedients — flags   of  truce,  as   it 
were,  to  enable  society  to  gather  wisdom  and 
strength  to  grapple  with  its  greatest  enemy, 
over-population. 


How  few  people  are  well  understood,  even 
by  their  most  intimate  friends.  We  think 
we  know  them,  but  there  is  a  sense  in  which 
those  we  know  best  are  strangers  to  us. 
There  are  chambers  in  every  human  soul  into 
which  not  even  the  eyes  of  our  best  beloved 
are  ever  permitted  to  gaze — thoughts  and 
emotions  that  none  are  ever  allowed  to  share. 
We  see  where  the  tide  breaks  in  crested 
billows  upon  the  strand  ;  we  hear  the  fierce 
roar  of  the  tempest  ;  we  note  the  angry 
glare  of  the  red  lightning  as  it  leaps  from 
cloud  to  cloud  ;  but  the  vast  unfathomed 
universe  of  soul  lies  beyond,  an  impenetrable 
profound,  unapproached  and  unapproachable 
forever. 


5O  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

USES    DF    TEMFT5.TTDN, 


!E  sometimes  think,  in  the  efforts  of  our 
temperance  friends  to  reform  the  world 
from  the  evils  of  intemperance,  and  in  which 
they  usually  lay  all  the  blame  upon  the 
liquor-seller,  that  they  do  not  fully  appre- 
ciate the  importance  of  temptation,  as  one  of 
nature's  means  of  testing  the  true  metal  and 
value  of  men.  The  occasional  and  moderate 
drinker — the  inebriate  and  downright  sot, — 
are  all  apt  to  be  regarded  as  the  innocent 
and  helpless  victims  of  the  rum-seller,  who 
cruelly  and  remorselessly  plies  his  wicked 
trade  to  the  undoing  of  his  fellow  beings. 

Now  there  is  not  a  young  man  who  has 
reached  the  age  of  intelligent  accountability, 
who  does  not  know  that  the  indulgence  in 
intoxicating  drinks  is  the  sure  road  to  ruin. 
There  is  not  an  habitual  drinker  or  drunkard 
who  does  not  realize  that  he  is  "  sowing  to 
the  wind,"  and  that  erelong  he  will  "  reap 
the  whirlwind  "  —that  he  is  feeding  his  brain 
with  *a  subtile  poison  that  is  slowly  but 
surely  sapping  the  foundations  of  reason, 


USES  OF  TEMPTATION.  5  I 

judgment,  will, — that  he  is  courting  physical 
decay  and  death  for  himself,  and  poverty  and 
wretchedness  for  his  family.  There  is  not 
one  of  all  this  class,  who,  in  yielding  himself 
to  the  demon  habit  of  drink,  does  not  do  so 
of  his  own  enlightened  volition,  thereby 
advertising  himself  to  the  world  as  one  in- 
competent to  withstand  the  temptations  of 
life,  and  who,  unless  he  reforms,  the  sooner 
he  drinks  himself  to  death  the  better  it  will 
be  for  his  family  and  friends. 

The  world  wants  men  who  can  walk 
unscathed  through  the  flames  of  hell,  if  neces- 
sary, and  with  no  trace  of  smoke  clinging  to 
their  garments.  Certain  it  is  it  has  but  little 
use  for  those  who  yield  themselves  willing 
victims  to  soul-destroying  habits  whose  evils 
are  placarded  upon  the  rum-blossomed  vis- 
ages, battered  forms,  wrecked  lives  and 
ruined  homes  they  witness  all  around  them. 
How  is  it  to  obtain  this  better  order  of  hu- 
manity ?  Certainly  not  by  wasting  much 
sympathy  upon  drunkards.  Pity  it  is,  rather, 
that  alcoholic  poisons  were  not  more  deadly 
in  their  effects,  that  they  might  operate  more 
quickly  in  ridding  the  world  of  those  who 


52  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

have  no  more  manhood  than  to  yield  them- 
selves willing  victims  to  their  baneful  influence. 

There  are  enough  people  in  the  world,  for 
all  practical  purposes,  who  do  not  need  this 
eternal  preaching  against  intemperance. 
Their  heads  are  level  against  the  demoral- 
izing vices  and  dissipations  of  life.  They 
are  the  only  kind  the  world  needs.  The 
rest  can  be  better  spared  than  not. 

We  do  not  believe  intemperance  can  ever 
be  made  sufficiently  odious  to  deter  men 
from  becoming  sots  until  the  odium  of  the 

o 

liquor  traffic  is  shifted  from  the  rum-seller  to 
the  rum-drinker.  Inebriation  should  be  made 
such  a  stigma  and  shame — such  a  brand  of 
infamy — that  men  would  shun  it  as  they 
would  the  plague.  Young  women  should 
refuse  to  associate  with  young  men  who  use 
Intoxicating  liquor.  And  as  to  marrying 
one  of  that  class — an  habitual  drinker, — they 
had  better  take  to  their  arms  a  putrifying 
corpse,  reeking  with  the  foul  odors  of  the 
grave.  Drunkenness  should  be  made  justi- 
fiable grounds  for  divorce  ;  and  wives  should 
refuse  to  bear  children  to  drunken  husbands. 
The  habitual  drunkard  should  be  disfran- 


USES  OF  TEMPTATION.  53 

chised  as  one  unfit  to  exercise  the  rights  of 
citizenship.  Drunkenness  should  be  regarded 
as  a  brand  of  weakness — of  an  effeminate 
and  worthless  manhood  to  be  hated  and 
loathed  of  all  the  earth. 

A  little  of  this  sort  of  treatment,  it  strikes 
us,  would  go  further  in  the  way  of  temper- 
ance reform  than  all  the  invective  that  can 
possibly  be  heaped  upon  the  heads  of  the 
liquor-sellers. 


PROVIDENCE  seldom  troubles  Himself  much 
about  the  welfare  of  a  man  who  does  not  put 
forth  every  effort  in  his  power  to  take  care  of 
himself.  And  yet  He  no  doubt  has  a  cor- 
dial hatred  for  the  one  who  makes  his  own 
welfare  the  exclusive  aim  and  end  of  exist- 
ence. 


THE  man  who  thinks  in  the  groove 
marked  out  for  him  to  think  in,  should  have 
the  manliness  to  get  out  of  his  groove  long 
enough  to  respect  the  one  who  strikes  out  in 
new  paths,  and  thinks  for  himself  even  though 
the  latter  should  think  erroneously. 


.54  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

INSPIRATION  DF  G-DDI]  DEEDS, 


|NE  of  our  noblest  and  purest-souled 
women  writes  :  "  I  never  read  of  a  no- 
ble act  that  it  does  not  inspire  me  to  something 
higher.  I  never  read  and  study  meanness  and 
hypocrisy  that  it  does  not  fill  me  with  a  deeper 
loathing  and  despising  for  that  which  is  low  in 
life."  And  so  our  acts,  whether  of  good  or  evil, 
are  made  helps  to  the  better  life  of  all  true 
souls.  No  one  can  live  wholly  for  himself. 
His  influence  in  some  way  reaches  out  and 
takes  in  all  humanity.  If  for  good,  then  all 
are  in  some  manner  made  better  thereby. 
If  for  evil,  then  will  it  be  wholly  evil  only  to 
himself?  All  glory  and  honor  to  the  man  or 
woman  who  lives  to  inspire  others  to  "  some- 
thing higher." 


THE  man  who  does  not  grow  wiser  and 
better  as  he  grows  older,  has  no  business  to 
be  here  ;  and  the  sooner  death  catches  him 
out,  the  better  for  the  world. 


CDMF-fiiNinNSHIF, 


;HE  man  or  woman  who  can  not  find 
1  sweet  companionship  and  profitable  so- 
ciety in  his  or  her  own  soul  is  poorly  quali- 
fied for  companionship  with  other  souls. 
The  miser  who  counts  over  his  treasures 
wants  no  companion  to  share  the  satisfaction 
he  feels.  He  finds  a  sordid  joy  in  solitude. 
The  soul  enriched  with  the  treasures  of 
knowledge,  and  the  heart  schooled  in  the 
virtues  that  ennoble  and  beautify  human 
character,  is  never  companionless.  Its  treas- 
ures are  a  well-spring  of  never  failing  joy. 
It  never  wearies  of  conning  them  o'er  and 
o'er.  Time  never  hangs  heavily  on  its  hands. 
It  is  never  lonesome,  nor  troubled  with  that 
haunting  demon  of  empty  brains,  ennui. 

Some  good  people  of  culture  and  large 
intelligence  have  an  idea  that  it  is  necessary 
always  to  entertain  their  friends.  We  con- 
cede that  such  entertainment  is  expected  and 
is  actually  necessary  to  the  happiness  of  a 
large  class  of  the  human  family  ;  but  we 


56  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

should  pray  for  deliverance  from  all  such 
friends.  Not  that  we  would  be  understood 
as  intimating  that  in  association  we  may  not 
find  true  enjoyment,  nor  that  the  attrition  of 
thought — of  mind  with  mind — is  not  essential 
in  bringing  out  sterling  traits  of  character, 
and  the  finest  intellectual  qualities  ;  but  the 
idea  we  would  convey  is  one  of  self-reliance. 
Make  friends  with  yourself — fill  the  chambers 
of  your  soul  with  delightful  companions,  and 
no  trouble  can  come  to  you,  or  losses  befall 
you,  that  will  leave  you  wholly  forsaken. 
You  will  then  have  resources  of  enjoyment 
to  fall  back  upon  that  no  legal  process  can 
deprive  you  of — intellectual  and  spiritual 
treasures  beyond  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
courts — a  bank  account  that  can  not  be 
overdrawn. 

The  emptiest  thing  in  all  this  world  is  an 
empty  soul  ;  and  whoever  is  content  to  sit 
down  with  folded  hands  in  quiet  indifference, 
amid  all  the  unappropriated  riches  of  the  uni- 
verse— the  golden  stores  of  thought — the 
unexplored  caves  of  knowledge, — and  live  on 
and  on  in  emptiness,  satisfied  with  his  spirit- 
ual and  intellectual  poverty,  has  no  right  to 


COMPANIONSHIP.  57 

intrude  his  idleness  and  worthlessness  upon 
the  precious  moments  of  men  and  women 
who  have  no  time  to  waste. 

But  whoever  has  an  aspiration  for  better 
things — would  seek  to  ascend  the  shining 
hights  and  realize  the  fruition  that  awaits  his 
efforts — will  never  want  for  a  helping  hand  to 
assist  him  on  the  way.  All  true  souls  are 
ever  delighted  to  help  and  encourage  others  ; 
but  they  should  never  be  taxed  to  waste 
their  strength  on  those  who  make  no  effort 
to  help  themselves. 


HE  is  not  wise  who  counts  himself  poor 
simply  because  he  possesses  but  a  humble 
store  of  this  world's  goods  ;  for  what  are 
houses  and  lands,  and  a  few  shining  baubles 
of  earth,  to  the  vast  treasures  of  the  universe 
that  are  the  common  heritage  of  all  aspiring 
souls  ? 


IT  is  far  more  creditable  for  a  young  lady 
to  earn  her  own  livelihood  by  some  respecta- 
ble vocation,  than  to  marry  some  rich  fool 
for  the  sake  of  a  home. 


58  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

THE  RELIGION  DF  LAUGHTER, 


SHE  Creator  of  man  is  also  the  Creator 
of  monkeys.  He  who  implanted  the 
spirit  of  mirth  in  human  nature  also  put  the 
warble  in  the  throat  of  the  canary,  the  grimace 
on  the  face  of  the  baboon,  and  the  pucker 
in  the  persimmon.  Nature  is  ever  inviting 
to  wholesome  recreation  and  diversion. 

A  world  with  a  sky  eternally  overcast 
with  clouds,  with  never  a  rift  of  sunshine — 
never  a  cloud  with  a  silver  lining — would  be 
a  most  gloomy  place  of  abode.  And  yet 
there  are  people  who  seem  to  think  that 
sunshine  is  a  curse  ;  that  a  hearty  laugh  is 
sure  evidence  of  total  depravity.  Tears, 
sighs  and  groans,  with  a  lugubrious  express- 
ion of  countenance  that  would  start  the 
goose-pimples  on  the  back  of  any  fun-loving 
Christian,  is  their  normal  condition — their 
idea  of  true  religion. 

Of  such  were  the  old,  unsavory  misan- 
thropes and  pious  lazzaroni  who  abjured  all 
the  comforts  and  pleasures  of  life,  and  mor- 


THE  RELIGION  OF  LAUGHTER.  59 

tified  their  worthless  bodies  with  all  manner 
of  deprivations,  and  even  tortures,  under 
the  mistaken  idea  that  they  were  thereby 
serving  their  Master.  Of  such,  also,  evi- 
dently, is  the  editor  of  the  New  York 
Evangelist,  who  regards  all  mirth  as  sinful, 
and  who  fortifies  his  argument  with  such 
nonsense  as  this  :  "In  the  record  of  the  life 
of  Christ  on  earth  we  have  no  intimation 
that  He  ever  indulged  in  laughter.  Not  one 
of  the  Prophets  or  Apostles  ever  attempted 
the  exercise  of  wit  in  their  writings.  Nor  is 
there  anything  in  the  description  of  Heaven 
to  lead  us  to  suppose  that  laughter  is  in- 
dulged in  there." 

If  the  saints  in  Heaven  never  laugh — if 
they  are  never  permitted  to  indulge  in  the 
least  bit  of  innocent  fun,  but  must  go  around 
forever  in  a  chronic  condition  of  psalm-sing- 
ing sadness — we  don't  want  to  go  there.  We 
would  prefer  to  take  our  lot  with  the  frolick- 
ing kids. 

Seriously,  we  believe  in  the  religion  of  fun 

—not    of  perpetual    frivolity  and    nonsense, 

but  of  rational  recreation  and  enjoyment — a 

religion    that    can    "weep    with    them    that 


60  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

weep,  and  rejoice  with  those  that  rejoice  ;"  a 
religion  that  delights  to  bask  in  the  sunshine, 
and  would  help  to  dispel  the  clouds  and 
gloom  that  lower  over  the  world. 

Trouble  and  sorrow  come  to  all.  There 
are  vastly  more  aching  hearts  in  the  world 
than  appears  upon  the  surface.  Many  a 
hidden  grief  is  glossed  over  with  a  smile. 

What  millions  of  souls  need  most  of  all  is 
the  leaven  of  a  cheerful,  abiding  trust — a 
reconciliation  with  the  universe.  They  need 
the  warm  pressure  of  a  cheerful,  loving  hand, 
to  lead  them  out  of  the  darkness  and  gloom 
of  their  own  morbid,  inharmonious  natures, 
and  into  the  gladsome  sunlight  and  good 
cheer  of  a  laughter-loving  existence. 


THE  man  who  thinks  it  no  wrong  to 
defraud  the  State, — either  by  evading  the 
payment  of  his  just  proportion  of  taxes,  or  by 
receiving  from  the  government  what  is  not 
justly  his  due, — possesses  all  the  elements 
of  a  first-class  thief.  He  needs  but  time  and 
opportunity  to  develop  a  high  order  of 
faculty  for  highway  robbery. 


UNPROFITABLE   SCOLDING-, 


does  no  good  to  rail  at  the  world — to 
blame  and  condemn  everybody,  who  does 
not  exactly  come  up  to  our  idea  of  what 
they  should  be — who  does  not  think  as  we 
think,  and  could  not  by  any  possibility,  un- 
less possessed  of  exactly  the  same  shape  and 
quality  of  brain,  and  had  been  born  and 
reared  under  exactly  the  same  conditions. 
The  head  might  as  well  rail  at  the  hand  for 
any  infirmity  the  latter  may  possess,  or  the 
hand  find  fault  with  the  foot  for  like  reason. 
We  are  all  members  of  one  social  body,  and 
common  sense  should  teach  us  that  scolding, 
or  harsh  measures  of  any  sort  only  aggravate 
the  evils  that  we  seek  to  correct. 

When  we  have  a  broken  limb  we  procure 
the  services  of  a  surgeon,  the  bones  are 
carefully  adjusted  and  held  in  place,  and  the 
wound  tenderly  nursed,  until  nature  effects  a 
cure.  The  limb  is  sometimes  so  badly  injured 
that  amputation  is  necessary  to  preserve  the 
rest  of  the  body.  Society  is  instituted  on 


62  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

very  much  the  same  principle  as  the  human 
body.  There  are  heads  to  do  the  thinking, 
shoulders  to  bear  the  burdens,  hands  to  per- 
form the  labor  and  stomachs  to  consume  the 
fruits  of  labor, — and  the  latter  often  without 
giving  an  equivalent  in  return. 

Wrong  doers  exist  everywhere.  They 
are  the  broken  limbs,  the  bunions  and  car- 
buncles, the  goiter  and  fever  sores,  the  torpid 
livers  and  stomach-aches  of  society.  They 
can't  all  be  amputated  or  dissected.  If  they 
could  be,  and  were,  there  would  be  but 
precious  little  of  the  body  left.  It  would  be 
but  a  dismantled  hulk,  with  some  staunch 
timbers  and  sound  planks,  but  the  whole 
badly  sprung  and  liable  to  fall  in  pieces  of 
its  own  weight. 

How  best  to  cure  the  infirmities  of  society 
has  been  the  problem  of  the  ages.  The 
regular  doctors  have  had  the  patient  in 
charge  for  nearly  two  thousand  years,  but 
with  only  indifferent  success.  It  has  been 
salivated,  blistered  and  physicked  until  it  has 
come  to  have  a  deep-seated  disgust  for  all 
sorts  of  moral  nostrums  ;  and  in  some  in- 
stances has  taken  to  quackery  with  still  worse 


UNPROFITABLE  SCOLDING.  63 

results,  or  to  no  medicine  at  all,  and  perhaps 
died  a  natural  and  spiritual  death. 

Now,  what  the  world  needs  most  is  that 
better  knowledge  which  teaches  the  great 
principle  of  kindness  as  a  rule  of  action  in 
the  treatment  of  the  frailties,  imperfections 
and  moral  infirmities  of  the  race.  The  cure 
must  commence  with  the  individual  and 
radiate  outward  like  the  warmth  of  the  sun- 
shine, or  the  glow  and  glory  of  a  manly  soul. 
It  is  man's  truest  and  noblest  mission  to 
nurse  the  weak,  reprove  with  gentleness  the 
wayward,  strengthen  and  encourage  the  fal- 
tering and  console  the  sorrowing  ;  and 
thereby,  if  possible,  to  leave  the  world  better 
than  he  found  it.  If  he  succeed  in  making 
his  own  life  sweet  and  unselfish  he  will  have 
accomplished  much.  If  he  learn  the  laws  of 
physical  health  and  faithfully  obey  them,  his 
simple  example  will  be  a  light  to  the  path  of 
others  which  .will  not  be  lost  to  the  world, 
and  if  in  the  spirit  of  that  broad  humanity 
and  charity  that  recognizes  kinship  in  all,  and 
sees  good  in  all,  he  seeks  the  highest  welfare 
of  his  brother  man, — one  such  life  will  be 
worth  more  to  the  world  than  vast  volumes 


64  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

of  moral  essays  frigid  with  thought  but  barren 
of  heart-throbs. 

Let  us  learn  this  lesson,  that  a  selfish  life 
is  a  mean  life,  and  that  the  good  we  do  to 
others  reacts  upon  ourselves  in  the  formation 
and  building  up  of  a  character  that  will  con- 
stitute the  only  wealth  we  can  ever  carry 
with  us  into  the  land  of  the  Beyond. 


A  TRUE   G-ENTLEMAN, 


TRUE  gentleman  is  a  rarer  thing 
among  men  than  many  suppose.  It 
isn't  wealth,  nor  fine  clothes,  nor  much  learn- 
ing, nor  high  social  position,  that  always  in- 
dicate a  real  gentleman.  He  is  quite  as  apt 
to  be  found  in  the  absence  of  all  these  ad- 
vantages and  accomplishments,  as  otherwise. 
The  principle  of  true  gentility  is  a  di^.cult 
thing  to  be  acquired  ;  it  must  be  inbred  in 
the  heart  to  be  lasting  and  reliable.  No 
gentleman  ever  intentionally  wounds  the  feel- 
ings of  another  without  cause.  He  is  never 
rude,  or  coarse,  or  impolite.  He  is  always 


A  TRUE  GENTLEMAN.  65 

the  true  and  chivalrous  friend  of  woman, 
defending  her  honor  and  good  name  when- 
ever and  wherever  assailed.  He  never  by 
word  or  act  calls  the  blush  of  offended  modesty 
to  the  cheek  of  innocent  girlhood.  Children, 
meeting  him  alone,  look  up  with  trustful 
confidence  into  his  face.  He  has  always  a 
kind  word  for  a  fellow  being  in  distress,  and 
a  helping  hand  for  the  needy.  He  is  never 
discourteous  or  overbearing  to  his  inferiors, 
nor  disrespectful  to  his  superiors.  What  he 
does  not  know  he  wisely  contents  himself  to 
wait  and  learn.  He  judges  others  by  the 
standard  of  genuine  character,  rather  than  by 
any  factitious  circumstance  of  wealth  and 
surroundings.  He  is  a  friend  that  may  be 
trusted,  and  would  scorn  to  betray  an  enemy. 
He  never  gossips,  nor  repeats  scandalous 
stones  of  his  neighbors.  He  prefers  to  think 
kindly  and  charitably  of  all.  In  short  he  is  a 
gentleman. 

THE  man  or  woman  who  gives  expression 
to  a  thought  calculated  to  benefit  or  bless 
mankind,  is  deserving  of  honor  in  this 
world,  and  a  place  in  the  affections  of  angels. 


66  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 


LIFE'S    TEMPLE, 


;  STOOD  by  the  mystical  altar 

Of  my  wondering,  worshiping  soul  ; 

While  out  from  my  being's  deep  center, 
O'er-arching  and  crowning  the  whole, 

A  temple  in  majesty  lifted 

Its  dome  like  an  infinite  scroll. 

With  columns  of  marvelous  whiteness 
And  patterns  of  strangest  design  : 

Its  wall  wrought  of  purple  and  crimson, 
All  cunning  and  beauty  combine  ; 

And  here  by  the  soul's  silent  altar 
I  stood — in  this  temple  of  mine. 

'Twas  morn,  and  the  scintillant  splendor 
Of  BEING  flashed  over  my  way, 

Like  the  tide  of  the  orient  sunbeams 
Rushing  in  to  embrace  the  new  day — 

Enfolding  the  earth  in  its  glory, 
And  driving  the  shadows  away. 

Around  me  were  groups  of  strange  faces, 
And  forms  that  intruded  between 

The  light  that  streamed  in  at  the  windows, 
And  flooded  with  dazzling  sheen 

The  altar,  whereon  there  were  written 
Life's  lessons,  all  plain  to  be  seen. 


*        LIFE'S  TEMPTE.  67 

The  faces  were  those  of  the  demons 

Of  evil,  that  lurk  to  betray — 
Of  Pride  and  of  selfish  Ambition — 

Of  indolence — eager  to  lay 
Their  snares  for  the  feet  of  my  spirit 

While  traversing  life's  rugged  way. 

And  yet  did  they  seem  to  my  vision 

Transfigured  to  angels  of  light — 
Fair  tempters,  of  ravishing  beauty, 

Beguiling  to  gentle  delight ; 
As  the  rose-tinted  glow  of  the  sunset 

Entices  to  darkness  and  night. 

Then  I  turned  me  away  from  the  altar, 
With  its  lessons  of  Truth,  for  awhile 

To  list  to  the  voice  of  their  pleading, 
And  dwell  in  the  light  of  a  smile 

That  was  cruel,  and  cold,  and  false-hearted— 
That  lured  evermore  to  beguile. 

#  *  *  * 

And  ever  the  altar  remaineth 

Emblazoned  in  letters  of  gold, 
To  lighten  the  pathway  of  duty 

To  pleasures  of  being  untold — 
All  time  and  the  mighty  hereafter 

Its  teachings  forever  enfold. 


LIFE   is   too  short  to  waste  any  one  of  its 
golden  moments  in  anger. 


BETTER  AS  IT  IS 


IHERE  are  many  people  who  are  egotis- 
tical enough  to  imagine  that  if  they  had 
had  the  making  of  the  Universe  they  could 
have  improved  somewhat  on  the  present  job. 
They  would  have  had  no  conjunction  of  the 
planets,  nor  great  disturbances  of  Nature  of 
any  kind — no  pestilence  nor  drought — no 
tidal  waves  nor  tornadoes — no  sickness  nor 
sorrow — none  of  the  ills  or  calamities  that 
flesh  is  heir  to.  They  would  have  made  the 
earth  ever  fruitful,  the  elements  ever  pro- 
pitious, and  life  ever  fair  and  prosperous. 

But  is  it  not  probable  that  under  such  con- 
ditions humanity  would  have  been  about  as 
tame  and  insipid  as  the  life  of  a  jelly  fish  ? 
As  the  thunder  storm  clears  and  purifies  the 
atmosphere,  as  the  furnace  fires  burn  away 
the  dross,  so  man's  struggle  with  the  elements 
is  necessary  to  build  up  his  individuality  and 
round  out  his  character.  He  must  needs 
wrestle  with  the  pestilence  and  the  storm 
— with  Summer's  heat  and  Winter's  cold — 


BETTER  AS  IT  IS.  69 

with  health  and  life-destroying  elements— 
with  the  hard  conditions  of  existence  that 
meet  him  at  every  turn.  His  struggles  give 
him  strength  and  vigor  of  limb  and  soul,  and 
enable  him  to  walk  erect  where  otherwise  he 
would  shrivel  back  into  the  primitive  type  of 
being  whence  he  sprung. 

Man's  business  here  is  to  deal  with  the 
Universe  as  he  finds  it,  and  to  adjust  himself 
to  it  in  every  possible  way  ;  not  to  quarrel 
with  it.  Nature  takes  no  more  thought  of 
him  as  a  physical  being  than  she  does  of  the 
reptile  or  the  rock.  Law  is  as  merciless  as 
the  glacier.  Upon  its  crest  is  safety — har- 
mony. Beneath  it,  grinding  atoms.  Who- 
ever violates  the  laws  of  health  or  being, 
intentionally  or  ignorantly,  suffers — dies.  He 
must  bear  the  pain  until  Nature,  gentle 
mother,  soothes  the  sufferer  to  rest.  There 
is  no  vicarious  atonement  for  matter. 
Though  the  mother  love  be  never  so  strong 
it  can  not  avert  the  mortal  agony  of  the 
darling  child. 

Nature  every  where  and  always  commands 
implicit  obedience  to  her  laws.  She  will 
have  it  at  any  cost ;  and  the  sooner  man 


JO  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

learns  this  fact,  and  profits  by  it,  the  better 
will  it  be  for  him.  He  should  learn  a  lesson 
of  the  reed,  that  bends  before  the  storm  ;  of 
the  lichen,  that  anchors  itself  to  the  rock  ;  of 
the  flower,  that  lifts  its  head  in  the  sunshine  ; 
of  the  bird,  that  carols  among  the  branches  ; 
of  the  bat,  that  hides  in  the  cave  by  day  ;  of 
the  laughter  of  children,  and  the  heart-throbs 
of  sorrow  ;  of  the  earthquake  and  the  light- 
ning ;  of  plenty  and  famine  ;  of  health  and 
sickness  ;  of  birth  and  death.  Nature  will 
deal  kindly  with  him  if  he  will  but  obey  her. 
She  will  gladden  his  life  with  blessings  in  a 
thousand  ways.  She  will  croon  to  him  in 
the  ripple  of  her  brooks,  and  in  the  murmur 
of  her  ocean  waves.  She  will  fan  him  with 
her  zephyrs  ladened  with  the  fragrance  of 
many  flowers.  She  will  give  him  health  of 
body  and  cheerfulness  of  soul.  She  will 
bend  over  him  her  loving  skies  all  radient 
with  stars,  and  will  beckon  him  onward  and 
upward  to  higher  planes  of  being. 

The  grandest  thing  in  the  Universe,  of 
which  we  have  any  knowledge,  is  a  noble 
soul,  living  to  some  noble  end.  This  is  Na- 

o 

ture's    crowning    fruition — her   rarest    handi- 


SUNDAY.  71 

work.  To  be  noble  and  live  nobly  should 
be  the  aim  and  ambition  of  all.  In  such  lives 
we  behold  the  promise  and  prophecy  of  a 
yet  to  be  glorious  humanity. 


SUNDAY, 


j|l||T  was  Sancho  Panza,  we  believe,  the 
«ii  factotum  and  servant  of  the  Knight  of 
the  Rueful  Countenance,  who  gave  utterance 
to  the  memorable  saying,  <f  Blessed  be  the 
man  that  invented  sleep."  We  might  sup- 
plement the  saying,  or  move  as  an  amend- 
ment, "  Blessed  be  the  man  that  invented 
Sunday." 

Looked  upon  simply  as  a  human  institution 

—and  in  that  light  we  are  disposed  to  regard 
it — it  is  the  very  embodiment  of  human  wis- 
dom. Indeed  it  is  the  grandest  of  all  in- 
ventions— one  fraught  with  the  greatest 
consequences  to  the  race.  It  is  the  sunburst 
through  the  cloud — the  light  upon  the  tower 

—the  gleam  of  hope  and  joy  to  the  soul. 


72  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

To  all  mankind  work  of  some  sort  is  a 
necessity.  To  the  vast  majority  it  is  the 
weary  bearing  of  heavy  and  often  times  pain- 
ful burdens,  with  no  rest  nor  respite  save 
that  which  comes  of  the  precious  custom 
which  dedicates  and,  in  a  religious  sense, 
consecrates  one-seventh  of  the  time  to  rest. 
Although  Sunday  is  claimed  by  the  church 
as  a  holy  day,  to  be  devoted  exclusively  to 
religious  uses,  it  also  belongs  to  the  world  to 
be  enjoyed  as  reason  and  conscience  should 
ever  dictate.  It  was  made  for  man,  and  is 
the  property  of  all  who  claim  it.  "  Let  no 
man  therefore,"  says  Paul,  " judge  you  in 
meat,  or  in  drink,  or  in  respect  of  an  holy- 
day,  or  of  the  new  moon,  or  of  the  Sabbath 
days." 

A  healthy  public  sentiment  needs  no 
Sunday  law  to  enforce  a  general  observance 
of  the  day.  By  making  Sunday  a  non-judicial 
day,  wherein  no  civil  business  is  required  to 
be  performed,  the  State  acts  most  wisely. 
In  this  it  has  the  approval  of  every  citizen  ; 
and  in  this  also  it  invites  a  general  suspension 
of  business,  that,  as  far  as  possible,  all  may 
enjoy  the  rest  they  need. 


SUNDAY.  73 

To  secure  the  best  and  truest  blessings  of 
Sunday  it  is  found  necessary  that  a  few 
should  work  in  order  to  enhance  the  comfort 
and  enjoyment  of  the  many.  Take,  for  in- 
stance, the  ferries  and  trains  leading  from  our 
great  cities,  upon  the  only  day  wherein  the 
toiling  multitudes  can  escape  for  a  breath  of 
fresh  air,  or  a  baptism  of  God's  beautiful  sun- 
shine. Take  our  religious  teachers,  who  are 
required  to  perform  their  hardest  work  on 
Sunday  ;  our  hotel  and  house-keepers  also,  and 
many  others,  who  can  not  escape  the  necessity 
of  toil  upon  that  day.  Surely  some  must  work 
for  others  to  profit  and  enjoy.  There  is  no- 
reasonable  escape  from  it. 

What  society  wants  is  a  higher  appreciation 
of  the  privileges  of  Sunday.  But  more  than 
all  it  wants  an  order  of  humanity  that  will 
have  a  higher  appreciation  of  all  days,  and  of 
the  opportunities  of  life  generally.  It  can 
not  well  have  the  former  until  it  secures  the 
latter.  All  that  hurts  or  degrades  man, 
physically  or  spiritually  ;  all  that  retards  his 
moral  and  intellectual  advancement ;  in  short, 
all  that  is  not  a  help  to  him  in  some  way, 
should  be  discountenanced.  To  this  end 


74  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

every  good  citizen  should  lend  a  helping 
hand.  For  in  that  direction  lies  the  truest 
welfare  of  society. 

Then,  "  welcome,  sweet  day  of  rest." 
Welcome,  thrice  welcome,  to  the  world's 
weary  ones  weighed  down  with  the  burdens 
of  many  cares.  How  glad  the  solace  that 
comes  of  a  day  of  rest  to  the  tired  hand  and 
exhausted  brain.  Eternal  Spirit  of  Wisdom, 
Love  and  Truth,  give  us  to  choose  the  better 
way  of  life  .that  shall  lead  up  to  a  Sabbath 
day  of  eternal  rest  and  peace. 

HE  who  strives  and  fails  should  never 
despair.  He  should  look  within  and  start 
anew — take  honor  for  his  chart,  courage  for 
his  compass,  and  the  highest  moral  and 
mental  culture  for  the  point  he  would  reach, 
—then  there  will  be,  there  can  be,  "  no  such 
word  as  fail." 

POVERTY  and  riches  are  only  relative  terms. 
They  are  to  a  large  extent  figments  of  the 
brain — creatures  of  the  imagination.  He 
only  is  poor  who  thinks  himself  so  ;  and  no 
one  is  truly  rich  who  is  not  rich  in  soul. 


DUR  YDUNG-  MEN, 


|HE  great  curse  of  the  age,  with  our 
young  men,  is  their  persistent  attempts 
to  live  a  fifteen-or-twenty-dollars-a-week  style 
of  life  on  a  ten-or-twelve-dollars  income. 
The  problem  is  just  about  as  difficult  of  so- 
lution as  that  of  the  passage  of  two  railroad 
trains  in  opposite  directions  over  the  same 
track. 

Now,  while  we  fully  appreciate  the  natural 
aversion  that  the  average  young  man  has  to 
being  lectured  at,  yet  we  apprehend  that  a 
few  friendly  hints  and  suggestions,  offered  in 
a  spirit  of  sympathy  for  him  and  charity  for 
his  mistakes,  will  not  be  taken  amiss. 

We  fully  understand  the  nature  of  the 
temptations  with  which  our  young  men  are 
constantly  beset.  Naturally  sociable  and 
disposed  to  be  convivial,  they  find  their  en- 
joyment mainly  in  association.  They  meet 
upon  the  street  corners,  and  at  the  saloons  ; 
they  find  a  hundred  avenues  for  their  some- 
what limited  means.  (We  refer  to  clerks 


76  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

and  mechanics  who  earn  all  the  way  from 
fifty  to  a  hundred  dollars  a  month.)  They 
treat  each  other  to  cigars  and  beer,  play 
billiards,  eucher,  and  occasionally  a  game  of 
draw  poker,  and  thus  they  readily  run  through 
from  five  to  ten  dollars  a  night,  perhaps 
more;  and  find  themselves  "dead  broke'' 
and  in  debt  at  the  end  of  the  week. 

By  far  the  most  deceptive  and  dangerous 
of  all  the  vices  to  which  our  young  men  are 
exposed  is  that  of  gambling,  for  it  carries 
with  it  nearly  every  other  vice  in  the  dark 
catalogue.  Especially  does  it  go  hand  in 
hand  with  drinking  ;  and,  if  persisted  in,  will 
as  surely  lead  to  ruin  as  the  needle  points  to 
the  pole. 

In  every  populous  community  there  can  be 
found  a  number  of  well-dressed,  genial,  hale 
fellows,  who  seem  to  have  no  fixed  occupa- 
tion. They  spend  their  nights  in  manipulat- 
ing the  cards,  and  are  up  to  all  the  tricks  of 
their  trade  which  come  of  skill  and  long 
practice.  These  men  live  mainly  off  our 
young  mechanics  and  clerks,  who  foolishly 
imagine  they  can  cope  with  them  in  their 
especial  vocation. 


OUR  YOUNG  MEN.  77 

And  then  there  is  another  class  of  young 
men,  who  manage  somehow  to  dress  well 
and  hold  up  their  heads  in  society,  who  at- 
tend all  the  sociables  and  parties,  and  are 
occasionally  seen  riding  after  a  spanking 
team.  "They  toil  not,  neither  do  they 
spin."  It  is  said  of  them  that  "  they  never 
miss  a  meal  nor  spend  a  cent."  They  are 
what  Beecher  would  call  a  species  of  para- 
site. They  live  by  borrowing.  They  meet 
our  industrious  young  men  at  every  turn. 
They  know  when  pay  day  comes,  the  exact 
amount  that  each  of  their  friends  receives, 
and  are  promptly  on  hand  to  strike  them  for 
a  "  piece." 

Any  young  man  who  is  in  the  habit  of 
spending  his  evenings  "  up  town,"  knows  all 
about  these,  and  various  other  kinds  of  para- 
sites. He  realizes  that  if  his  earnings  were 
double  what  they  are  he  would  not  be  able 
to  meet  all  the  demands  and  drains  made 
upon  him. 

But  what  is  he  to  do  ?  Would  you  de- 
prive him  of  all  social  pleasure — of  all  enjoy- 
ment of  friendly  intercourse  with  his  com- 
panions and  fellows  ?  Not  at  all ;  we  would 


78  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

elevate  the  standard  and  character  of  his 
enjoyments.  Instead  of  his  indulging  in 
those  practices  which  destroy  health  and 
debase  the  soul,  we  would  inspire  him  with  a 
taste  for  those  enjoyments  which  ennoble  the 
man — which  add  health  and  length  of  years— 
which  adorn  and  beautify  for  time  and 
eternity. 

See  here,  my  boy,  do  you  know  the  real 
enjoyment  there  is  in  a  good  book  ?  Are 
you  familiar  with  our  standard  authors  ? 
Have  you  read  Dickens  and  Washington 
Irving?  Has  your  mind  ever  caught  the 
glow  and  glory  that  flash  out  from  the  works 
of  those  great  thinkers  of  the  age,  Huxley> 
Lecky,  Herbert  Spencer,  Tyridall,  Darwin, 
John  Stuart  Mill,  and  others  ?  Do  you  know 
what  real  and  unfading  joy  there  is  in  the 
companionship  of  good  books  ?  Compared 
with  the  soul-destroying  pleasures  of  a  night's 
carouse,  they  are  as  daylight  to  the  murky 
night — the  calm  of  a  Spring  morning  to  the 
dismal  wail  of  the  tempest.  Suppose  you 
' 'turn  over  a  new  leaf  for  a  while,  and  try 
it.  Shake  off  some  of  the  leeches  that  are 
sucking  your  life  out.  Provide  yourself  with 


EVIL  HABITS.  79 

some  choice  books  and  spend  your  evenings 
at  home.  Deposit  five  dollars  of  your 
weekly  earnings  in  a  savings  bank.  Try 
it  for  a  year  ;  and  our  word  for  it,  at 
the  end  of  that  period  you  will  find 
yourself,  in  addition  to  the  money  saved,  in 
possession  of  a  stock  of  manhood,  self- 
respect  and  general  knowledge  that  will  be 
worth  to  you  a  thousand  times  the  effort  it 
costs. 


EVIL  HABITS, 


|HE  power  of  evil  habit  is  almost  as 
strong  as  Nature  itself.  Indeed,  it 
becomes  "  second  nature,"  when  its  hold 
upon  one  is  not  easily  broken — just  as  an 
excrescence  upon  a  tree  becomes,  from 
growth,  a  part  of  the  tree  itself. 

Character  is  made  up  of  an  aggregation  of 
habits, — good,  bad  and  indifferent.  Hence, 
the  importance,  to  young  people  especially, 
of  forming  as  many  of  the  former,  and  as  few 
of  the  bad  and  indifferent  as  possible. 

The  young  man  who  yields  himself  a  slave 


8O  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

to  any  debasing  habit,  mortgages  his  body 
to  corruption  and  his  soul  to  the  Devil  (if 
there  be  a  Devil).  His  manhood  must  in- 
deed be  of  an  inferior  quality  if,  while  re- 
volting at  his  chains,  he  nevertheless  lacks 
the  power  to  break  them. 

But  we  do  not  believe  in  that  kind  of  ab- 
solute subjection  to  habit.  We  believe  it 
possible,  by  a  proper  exercise  of  will,  for  any 
sane  person  to  throw  off  the  shackles  of  evil 
habit,  and  go  forth  into  the  world  a  free  man. 
We  are  free  agents  to  that  extent  that  we 
certainly  have  command  of  our  own  bodies. 
We  can  surely  eat  or  drink  that  which  pol- 
lutes or  destroys,  or  we  can  leave  it  alone. 
We  can  keep  ourselves  wholesome  and 
clean,  or  we  can  wallow  in  all  manner  of  im- 
purity. 

We  insist  that  no  person  who  permits 
himself  to  associate  with  his  fellows,  or  who 
thrusts  himself  into  their  presence,  has  the 
moral  right  to  offend  his  associates  by  his 
personal  untidiness.  He  has  no  moral  right 
to  poison  the  atmosphere  which  others  are 
compelled  to  breathe  with  the  vile  odors  ot 
tobacco  or  rum* 


EVIL  HABITS.  8  I 

There  are  many  otherwise  excellent  people 
who  are  so  abjectly  the  slaves  of  these  twin 
habits  of  evil  that  they  will  tell  you 
they  have  not  the  power  to  break  loose 
from  them.  We  do  not  believe  them. 
We  do  not  believe  the  man  lives,  with 
brains  enough  to  know  that  he  is  a  man, 
who  can  not,  if  he  will,  rise  superior  to 
all  evil  habits — who  can  not  turn  away 
from  all  that  defiles  the  temple  of  the  living 
soul,  and  walk  henceforth  in  an  atmosphere 
of  physical  purity. 

A  wise  man  will  learn  from,  and  profit  by 
experience.  Whatever  he  finds  hurtful  to 
his  physical  health  he  will  school  himself  to 
abjure,  no  matter  how  great  the  temporary 
gratification  therefrom.  If  he  does  not  find 
the  indulgence  in  any  habit  really  hurtful,  he 
will  ask  himself  the  questions,  What  good 
does  it  bring  me  ?  Does  it  make  me  a  more 
wholesome  companion  for  the  one  whose  lot 
is  cast  by  my  side  ?  Is  the  cost  one  that  I 
can  readily  afford  ?  and  could  I  not  use  the 
money  to  a  better  purpose  ? 

If  that  pale,  effeminate  young  man  at  the 
street  corner,  who  has  acquired  the  modern 


82  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

scholastic  art  of  deftly  rolling  a  cigarette, 
and  who  can  expel  the  smoke  therefrom 
through  his  nose,  without  the  least  sympa- 
thetic moisture  of  the  eye,  could  only  realize 
the  enervating  effect  upon  his  physical  sys- 
tem— that  he  is  pickling  the  nerves  and 
tissues  of  his  body  with  a  subtile  poison  that 
will  make  him  a  walking  stench  among  men 
and  angels — it  would  seem  that  he  would 
"  swear  off"  forever. 

This  is  a  hard  world  to  wrestle  with  at 
best.  One  needs  all  his  powers  of  mind  and 
body — perfect  health  of  brain  and  brawn — to 
stand  up  manfully  in  the  front  rank  and  do 
brave  work.  He  who  fritters  away  his 
strength  by  indulgence  in  any  debasing 
habit,  is  fitting  himself  to  take  a  back  seat  in 
the  drama  of  life.  He  is  making  of  himself  a 
donkey  for  others  to  ride. 

Young  man,  break  the  fetters  of  evil 
habit,  and  stand  forth  in  the  freedom  of  a 
noble  and  unsullied  manhood,  with  your  face 
to  the  front.  Strong  of  will  and  panoplied 
with  good  resolutions,  go  forth  to  noble 
conquests,  the  garnered  fruits  of  which  shall 
constitute  treasures  of  soul  that  "nor  moth 


MUSINGS.  8  3 

nor  rust  can  corrupt,  nor  thieves  break  through 
and  steal." 


MUSING-S 


jHERE  are  souls  in  the  magnitude  of 
whose  grand,  divine  natures,  all  good- 
ness and  nobility  of  character  seem  to  be 
gathered — souls  whom  but  to  know  is  to 
reverence  and  adore.  Not  upon  thrones,  or 
in  the  high  places  of  earth,  need  we  look  for 
them,  for  there  they  are  seldom  to  be  found  ; 
but  in  the  humbler  walks  of  life,  and  in  the 
silent  ways  of  duty,  we  may  behold  them, 
shining  out  like  diamonds  among  the  common 
things  of  earth.  But  who  can  fathom  the 
intensity  of  such  natures !  Indeed,  what  a 
restless,  longing  torturing  thing  is  a  finely 
organized,  sensitive  human  nature.  Born  to 
suffering  and  to  joy,  how  keen  to  every 
emotion  of  sorrow  or  of  pleasure.  To-day 
radiant  with  the  sunlight  that  plays  on  the 
mountain  peaks  of  heaven — to-morrow  a  bird 
with  broken  wing  hiding  amid  the  shadows. 
—So  keyed  to  the  divine  harmonies — so 


84  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

sensitive  to  the  discords  and  jarrings  of  social 
life — that  existence  becomes  at  times  almost 
intolerable.  Others  there  are  who  live  so 
completely  in  the  physical  that  they  need 
but  to  be  well  fed  and  well  sheltered  to  be 
happy.  But  it  is  the  happiness  of  the  sloth 
basking  in  the  sun — of  the  insensate  lichen 
vegetating  upon  the  rock.  The  soul's  ca- 
pacity for  enjoyment  is  measured  by  its 
power  to  suffer.  Hence  it  is  an  open  ques- 
tion with  some  whether  the  higher  life  of  the 
soul  is  at  all  desirable,  for  with  it  must  ever 
come  the  unsatisfied  outreachings  of  the 
deathless  spirit — its  quenchless  thirst  for 
"more."  And  yet  infinitely  better  this  than 
the  life  of  the  mollusk — of  the  dull  clod,  that 
lives  its  little  day,  and  dies,  "thrust  foully 
into  earth  to  be  forgot."  Better  the  night  of 
storm  and  darkness,  followed  by  the  rose- 
tinted  daybreak  and  the  glorious  morn,  than 
the  continuous  glare  of  a  never  setting  sun. 
Better  the  keen  agony  with  its  vivid  com- 
pensation of  gladness,  than  the  life  whose 
heart-throb  never  leaps  with  the  lightning  of 
passion,  nor  quivers  with  the  emotion  of 
tender  sympathy. 


SOPHISTRIES, 


|||N  an  article  by  an  eminent  physician  in 
iii  the  New  England  Medical  Journal  we 

Cy  +s 

find  these  somewhat  startling  assertions  : 
"  Insane  people,  like  those  who  are  sane, 
"  have  no  power  to  resist  the  strongest  mo- 
"  tive.  No  beings  that  ever  lived  possessed 
"  the  power  to  do  different  from  what  they 
"did." 

There  is  a  sophistry  of  reasoning  calcu- 
lated to  mislead  and  befog  the  mind.  By  it 
wrong  may  be  made  to  appear  right,  light 
darkness.  Such  we  regard  the  reasoning 
that  leads  the  mind  to  such  conclusions  as 
those  given  above. 

For  instance,  we  are  told  by  those  who 
believe  in  this  irresponsibility  of  action  that 
no  sane  mind  acts  without  motive — that  mo- 
tive is  not  subject  to  will — that  the  mind 
must  necessarily  yield  to  the  strongest 
motive, —  and  that  therefore  whatever  a  man 
does  he  is  compelled  to  do. 

This    process    of    reasoning,    if    accepted, 


86  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

leaves  the  opponents  of  such  conclusions 
without  any  ground  to  stand  on.  It  takes 
away  from  man  the  last  vestige  of  moral 
accountability,  and  rnakes  him  the  veriest 
shuttlecock  of  irresistible  fate. 

If  such  was  the  prevailing  belief  of  the 
world,  man  would  soon  settle  back  into  the 
lower  types  of  life  whence  he  sprung,  and 
chaos  would  come  again.  But  the  reasoning, 
in  our  judgment,  is  fallacious,  and  the  con- 
clusions wrong. 

It  is  no  doubt  true  that  man  is  very 
largely  subject  to  conditions  of  birth,  educa- 
tion and  surroundings.  We  can  readily  see 
that  he  is  a  free  moral  agent  only  in  a  limited 
sense,  if  at  all.  If  born  in  vice,  and  educated 
in  crime,  he  will  be  very  apt  to  be  a  crimi- 
nal— although  the  rule  is  not  absolutely  in- 
variable ;  and  it  is  this  variation  of  rule  that 
lies  at  the  basis  of  all  evolution.  Like  a 
horse  tethered  to  a  stake,  with  freedom  to 
crop  the  herbage  over  a  circumscribed  area, 
so  man,  in  a  moral  sense,  is  free  to  act  within 
a  certain  length  of  rope.  He  knows  the 
right  from  the  wrong.  He  is  capable  of 
weighing  and  determining  the  motives  that 


SOPHISTRIES.  87 

prompt  him  to  do  the  one  or  avoid  the 
other.  If  the  wrong  he  does  was  the  right 
thing  for  him  to  do, — the  thing  concerning 
which  he  had  no  volition  and  was  compelled 
to  do — why  should  he  experience  regret  for 
wrong  doing  ? 

We  say  the  reasoning  which  leads  to  such 
fatal  conclusions  as  those  quoted  is  erroneous. 
It  makes  man  a  mere  machine,  as  helpless  as 
the  weather  vane  upon  a  church  steeple,  or 
the  insensate  clod  that  is  swept  along  by  the 
flood. 

The  man  who  acts  upon  a  criminal  impulse 
or  motive  to  steal,  where  detection  and  pun- 
ishment are  uncertain,  restrains  that  impulse 
with  the  certainty  of  detection  and  punish- 
ment before  him.  Thus  he  is  able  to  shape 
and  control  motive.  And  just  here  the  weak 
point  in  the  reasoning  referred  to  is  seen  to 
be  that  it  is  based  upon  false  premises.  The 
strongest  motive  is  not  irresistible  ;  or,  if  it 
is,  then  it  is  in  some  sense  subject  to  the 
will."  That  is,  one  who  wants  a  plausible 
excuse  for  doing  wrong  can  readily  shape 
the  motive  to  afford  him  that  excuse. 

The  human  intellect  is  as  many  sided  as 


88  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

the  shapes  of  the  brain.  In  its  operations 
we  find  that  there  is  a  mysterious  something- 
that  seems  to  sit  behind  all  the  faculties,  and 
that  stimulates  or  curbs  their  actions — that 
encourages  this  and  condemns  that.  This 
is  the  EGO — the  conscious  ME — the  autocrat 
of  volition.  Otherwise  there  could  be  no 
such  thing  as  reason  or  judgment. 

No  man  ever  lived  that  did  his  best  in  all 
directions  of  his  nature.  If  he  reasoned  him- 
self into  the  conviction  that  he  did,  it  was 
simply  that  he  might  find  a  pretext  for  doing 
something  that  his  inclinations  invited,  but 
which  his  judgment  condemned. 

Once  grounded  in  this  fatalism  there 
would  be  nothing  to  stimulate  man  to  effort. 
Why  should  he  try,  when  trying  costs  self- 
denial  and  toil,  and  oftentimes  sore  hardship 
and  privation  ?  It  would  be  far  easier  not  to 
try.  Why  should  he  walk  the  thorny  path 
of  duty  when  the  way  of  indolent  ease  was 
far  more  inviting  ?  Besides,  he  would  be 
entitled  to  no  credit  therefor.  If  he  went  to 
the  bad  he  couldn't  help  it,  and  if  he  did  not 
it  would  be  all  the  same  !  It  is  well  for  the 
world  that  men  reject  such  conclusions. 


KEEP  TD  THE  RIGHT, 


IEEP  to  the  right,"  is  a  law  of  the  road, 
which,  when  obeyed,  saves  one  a  world 
of  trouble. 

Society  is  a  public  highway  on  a  grand 
scale — a  great  moral  turnpike  whereon  a 
hurrrying,  jostling,  restless  crowd  of  badly 
assorted  humanity  is  ever  thronging.  Here 
is  life  in  all  its  better  phases — childhood 
with  its  golden  hair  and  wondering  eyes  ; 
youth  with  its  widening,  thoughtful  outlook  ; 
manhood  with  its  firm  step  and  earnest  pur- 
pose ;  old  age  with  its  bowed  form  and 
whitened  locks.  Here,  too,  are  thickly 
strewn  the  wrecks  of  life — misguided  child- 
hood, headstrong  and  wayward ;  erring 
youth,  rioting  in  frivolity  and  dissipation,  and 
sowing  the  seeds  of  physical  decay  and  moral 
death  ;  vicious  manhood,  treading  the  down- 
ward road  ;  and  decrepit  age,  sinister  and 
sere,  with  its  painful  memories,  and  hope- 
less future, — all  commingling  in  the  one 
great  journey  from  the  cradle  to  the  grave. 


90  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

How  much  discord,  inharmony  and  jostling 
would  be  avoided,  in  this  journey,  if  each 
traveler  would  only  "  keep  to  the  right." 

There  is  a  pitfall  before  you,  young  man— 
a  temptation  to  evil — a  snare  for  your  feet. 
You  are  forming  habits  of  idleness,  dissi- 
pation and  extravagance,  which  will  stick  to 
you  like  the  shirt  of  Nessus,  hampering  your 
nobler  efforts,  and  eventually  dragging  you 
down  to  the  gateway  of  despair.  Keep  to 
the  right  and  avoid  it. 

That  is  a  doubtful  business  venture,  sir,  in 
which  you  are  about  to  engage, — one,  per- 
haps, involving  loss  of  self-respect  and  sacri- 
fice of  manly  principle.  You  see  where,  by 
taking  advantage  of  your  neighbor's  igno- 
rance, you  can  get  the  best  of  him  in  a  trade  ; 
or  by  some  smart  trick  of  the  law  you  can 
evade  some  responsibility  you  have  willingly 
assumed,  or  shirk  some  duty  that  lies  in  your 
way.  Keep  to  the  right  ;  there  only  is  the 
path  of  honor. 

You,  neighbor,  when  tempted  to  deal  in 
gossip  or  scandal, — to  give  way  to  the 
natural  meanness  within  you — to  let  your 
temper  get  the  upper  hand  of  your  judgment 


KEEP  TO  THE  RIGHT.  9  I 

—to  play  the  tyrant  in  your  family — to 
withhold  the  gentle  word  of  love  or  praise 
from  her  who  walks  by  your  side — to  lower 
the  standard  of  your  honor,  or  do  ought  that 
would  make  you  less  manly  or  noble  in  the 
eyes  of  good  men  or  angels,  keep  to  the 
right. 

"  Keep  to  the  right."  These  golden  words 
should  be  engraven  in  letters  of  living  light 
on  the  temple  of  every  human  soul.  They 
should  stand  forth  as  finger-posts  at  the 
junction  of  every  wrong — at  the  point  of 
every  divergence  from  the  straight  path  of 
rectitude — by  every  wayside  temptation. 
Keep  to  the  right,  young  man,  spurning 
every  ignoble  thought — every  unmanly 
action.  Thus  will  you  lay  up  treasures  for  a 
grand  old  age,  and  life  will  bear  for  you  its 
richest  fruits. 

PARENTS  who  wear  out  their  lives  in  the 
acquisition  of  property  to  leave  for  their 
children  to  scatter,  do  a  double  wrong — 
first  to  themselves  and  next  to  their  children. 
The  bird  that  would  learn  to  fly  must  lean  on 
its  own  wines. 

o 


g  2  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

CRH.B-.H.FFLE  DIGNITY, 


|OME  people  are  got  up  on  the  crab- 
apple  plan.  They  are  so  sour  and  puck- 
ery  that  no  one  cares  to  pluck  them.  Who- 
ever attempted  it  would  be  apt  to  prick  his 
fingers  with  the  thorns  and  wish  he  had  not 
undertaken  the  job.  They  seem  to  enjoy 
themselves  most  when  they  are  most  miser- 
able. They  are  constantly  on  the  look-out 
for  slights  and  affronts,  and  live  in  a  chronic 
condition  of  apprehensiveness  that  somebody 
will  say  something  about  them  they  may  not 
hear.  They  pride  themselves  on  their  blunt- 
ness,  and  glory  in  their  angularities.  They 
are  the  moral  porcupines  of  society,  whom  it 
were  better  not  to  disturb,  but  to  turn  out 
for  and  pass  on  the  other  side.  Such  people 
little  realize  how  much  of  the  real  enjoyments 
of  life  they  miss — how  much  they  withhold 
from  their  fellows. 

It  surely  pays  to  be  affable,  especially  as 
it  costs  nothing.  It  requires  no  more  effort 
of  the  vocal  organs  to  speak  kindly  than  un- 


CRAB-APPLE  DIGNITY.  93 

kindly,  and  generally  not  as  much.     We  can 
scatter  flowers  or  brambles  in  our  pathway- 
sunshine  or  shade.     Who  would  not  greatly 
prefer  the  former  to  the  latter  ? 

Social  and  domestic  life  would  be  infinitely 
sweeter  if  people  generally  cultivated  the 
suavities  and  tried  to  make  themselves 
agreeable.  Some  people  imagine  they  are 
dignified,  when  in  fact  they  are  only  morose 
and  cross-grained.  They  walk  through  life 
with  the  solemnity  of  an  owl,  surrounded  by 
an  atmosphere  as  crisp  and  frosty  as  the 
breath  of  an  iceberg.  In  the  home  circle,  in 
social  life,  in  the  walks  of  business,  their 
presence  is  enough  to  start  the  "goose  pim- 
ples "  upon  the  back  of  every  person  with  a 
sunny  nature.  Such  people  may  have  their 
uses  in  the  world,  but  we  have  never  been 
able  to  discover  exactly  wherein. 

Give  us  for  companionship  the  man  or 
woman  with  as  little  of  that  kind  of  dignity 
as  possible — one  that  can  romp  with  child- 
hood— can  laugh  with  those  who  laugh  and 
weep  with  those  who  weep.  Give  us  the 
man  or  woman  with  nature  all  radiant  with 
the  glow  and  gladness  of  a  sympathetic  hu- 

OFTHE 

[  UNIVERSITY 


94  °UR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

manity — one  that  never  mistakes  indigestion 
for  religion,  or  a  torpid  liver  for  sobriety. 
There  are,  thank  goodness,  many  such  in 
the  world.  If  there  were  not  we  should 
lose  faith  in  the  race,  and  believe  no  more 
in  the  law  of  human  progress.  The  mil- 
lennium would  be  but  a  wild  fantasy  of  the 
imagination — a  never-to-be  realized  dream. 

It  is  in  the  goodness,  the  nobility,  of  the 
few  that  we  behold  the  prophecy  of  better 
things  for  all.  Hence,  we  take  courage  and 
move  on,  content  to  labor  and  to  wait — to 
plant  the  seed  and  bide  the  fruitage. 

Few  people  strive  to  do  their  best — none 
fully  succeed.  The  heroism  is  in  the  striving. 
If  all  would  try,  the  world  would  be  the  bet- 
ter for  it.  But  some  are  so  constituted  that 
they  have  little  or  no  disposition  to  try. 
What  we  want  is  a  breed  of  humanity  that  has 
the  deeply-rooted  determination  to  climb  to 
a  better  life  and  the  grip  to  hold  on.  It 
will  come  some  time,  we  believe,  in  the 
march  of  the  ages. 

A  BORN  rogue  is  the  hardest  kind  of  a 
rogue  to  reform. 


BENDING-  BEFORE  THE   G-ALE, 


jHERE  are  no  hearts  so  brave  or  strong- 
that  do  not  at  times  quail  before  some 
great  sorrow.  The  shadow  falls  across  their 
pathway  when  they  are  least  expecting  it,  or 
least  prepared  for  it,  shutting  out  the  bright 
sky  and  beautiful  sunshine,  and  not  even 
leaving  one  star  to  beckon  them  away  to 
brighter  realms.  Suddenly  spreads  the  pall 
of  gloom  over  the  soul,  like  the  dark  and 
remorseless  hand  of  fate,  and  where  so  lately 
was  heard  the  music  and  melody  of  the 
spheres — the  laughter  of  children,  the  songs 
of  birds  and  the  sweet  voice  of  love — is 
heard  the  wail  of  woe,  or  keen  anguish  riots 
in  silence  among  the  heartstrings.  Death 
lays  its  icy  finger  upon  the  lips  we  love — the 
heart  that  nestled  close  to  ours  through  the 
golden  days  of  our  lives  is  torn  from  our 
arms  for  aye — the  voice  that  made  sweet 
melody  in  our  ears  is  heard  no  more — and 
the  agony,  keen  and  pitiless,  is  upon  us  like 
an  avalanche  ere  we  are  aware. 


9 6  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

We  say,  these  shadows  come  to  all. 
They  are  incident  to  this  mortal  life.  It 
could  not  well  be  otherwise  in  this  earthly 
stage  of  existence.  Men  may  preach  till  the 
''crack  of  doom"  the  philosophies  that 
should  reconcile  us  to  these  great  over- 
whelming sorrows.  Such  preaching  is  always 
for  others,  not  for  ourselves.  When  our 
own  hearts  are  riven — when  the  arrow  pierces 
our  own  souls — we  must  enter  the  Gethse- 
mane  of  anguish  alone.  There  is  none  to 
bear  our  burdens,  no  more  than  there  was  to 
bear  the  burdens  of  Him,  the  Man  of  Sor- 
rows, in  that  agonizing  struggle  wherein  we 
are  told  He  "  sweat  great  drops  of  blood." 

But  Nature,  gentle  mother,  although 
seemingly  cruel  as  the  grave,  is  nevertheless 
tender  and  kind.  Over  the  field  of  carnage 
and  death,  where  shot  and  shell  plow  their 
way  through  struggling  masses  of  living  men, 
and  the  earth  is  rent  and  torn,  and  made 
ghastly  with  the  mangled  slain,  the  dews 
and  the  gentle  rains  descend  like  a  bene- 
diction, and  over  all  the  balm  of  the  sun- 
shine, like  the  smile  of  God,  sheds  its  sweet 
baptism,  and  erelong  the  grasses  and  the 


BENDING  BEFORE  THE  GALE.        97 

wild  flowers  come  with  their  soft  and  beauti- 
ful vestments  to  hide  the  cruel  scars  of  war. 
So  with  the  stricken  heart.  In  time  the  fury 
of  the  storm  is  spent  ;  the  tempest  and  the 
whirlwind  of  emotion  are  lulled  to  sleep,  and 
rest  and  peace,  with  their  mild  and  gentle 
solace,  come  with  angel  fingers  to  bind  up 
the  bruised  heart  and  calm  the  troubled  soul. 

These  are  the  experiences  of  life  that 
come  to  all.  They  are  the  experiences  that 
seem  most  necessary  to  discipline  the  soul 
and  fit  it  for  that  higher  plane  of  life  and 
usefulness,  towards  which  all  progressed  and 
progressive  humanity  is  tending. 

The  lesson  we  would  draw  from  this 
theme  is,  that  while  we  can  not  avert  these 
apparently  dire  events  in  our  lives,  we  should 
school  our  natures  to  accept  them  as  a  part 
of  the  training  and  discipline  we  need,  and 
without  which  we  should  be  but  poorly  quali- 
fied for  those  higher  spiritual  and  intellectual 
enjoyments  to  which,  whether  ever  to  be 
realized  or  not,  every  true  soul  should  aspire. 
We  should  learn  to  feel  that  they  are  the 
refining  fires  that  burn  away  the  dross  and 
coarseness  of  our  natures — that  they  are 


98  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

stepping-stones,  if  rightly  used,  to   a    higher 
plane  of  thought  and  feeling. 


PASSING  DN, 


!§j|N  the  great  sum  of  human  life  of  how 
H!  little  significance  is  each  individual  unit. 
Even  the  world's  greatest  men  and  women 
drop  out  of  the  places  they  once  occupied, 
and  which  we  thought  no  others  could  fill  as 
well,  and  are  soon  forgotten  ;  or,  if  they 
live,  it  is  in  their  works  rather  than  in  their 
individual  memories.  Thus  Homer,  Shaks- 
pere,  Milton,  Byron,  Titian,  Mozart,  and  all 
the  world's  once  great  masters  of  song  and 
art,  are  no"  longer  personal  entities  to  us  ;  but 
rather  the  works  which  they  wrought,  and  in 
which  they  will  live  forever. 

In  the  state,  in  communities,  in  the  smaller 
circles  of  public,  social  and  domestic  life,  our 
best  known  citizens,  friends  and  neighbors, 
one  after  another,  pass  away, — a  moment's 
surprise,  a  sigh  of  tender  regret,  a  heart- 
burst  of  agony,  perhaps, — and  soon  no  trace 


PASSING  ON.  99 

or    ripple   is    left    upon   the    surface  of  life's 
broad  sea.      In  public  life,  or  in  the  ranks  of 
citizenship,   their    places    are    soon  filled  by 
others,   the    dismembered  ranks  are    closed, 
and  the  onward  march  is  unbroken  forever. 

Of  all  the  world's  countless  millions, 
sweeping  onward  in  vast  cycles  from  infancy 
to  old  age,  how  few  are  remembered  longer 
than  during  the  generation  in  which  they 
live.  Like  the  shifting  colors  of  the  kaleido- 
scope, such  is  human  life — ever  changing  into 
new  and  wonderful  forms  ;  and  ever  evolving 
from  the  lower  forms  types  of  the  higher, 
and  the  higher  still,  to  mark  the  steadily  ad- 
vancing progress  of  the  race. 

Death  and  decay  is  written  upon  all  life. 
He  through  whose  veins  now  flows  the  red 
tide  of  health,  whose  will  is  strong  to  do  and 
dare,  and  whose  hand  is  quick  to  perform,, 
nurses  in  his  bosom  the  seeds  of  dissolution, 
which  will  ere  long  bourgeon  and  blossom, 
and  bear  fruit  for  the  grave.  The  cheek  and 
eye  of  beauty,  that  glow  to-day  with  the 
sparkle  of  roseate  health,  will  wither  and  pale 
with  age,  or  fade  away  at  the  touch  of  disease 
and  death. 


IOO  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

Thus,  even  in  man's  proudest  and  best  es- 
tate, how  absolutely  little  does  he  not  seem. 
How  vain  his  unbridled  ambitions — how 
empty  the  laurels  the  world  places  on  his 
brow.  A  few  years  hence  and  naught  of 
himself  will  remain  but  a  handful  of  dust  that 
a  breath  would  scatter  into  nothingness. 
The  good  or  evil  that  he  did — the  deeds  that 
he  wrought — are  all  that  will  survive  to  bless 
or  tarnish  his  memory. 

This,  then,  should  be  the  end  and  aim  of 
all,  to  so  act  that  this  life  shall  not  not  only 
afford  to  each  its  largest  meed  of  health  and 
happiness,  but  that  the  memory  of  things 
done — the  monuments  of  good  deeds  erected 
here — shall  survive  the  mutations  of  time,  to 
blaze  the  way  for  others  who  are  to  follow. 


HE  who  is  a  stockholder  in  the  stars,  in 
the  glad  sunshine,  in  the  fragrance  of  the 
flowers,  in  the  songs  of  birds  and  in  the 
laughter  of  children,  and  who  has  an  interest 
in  the  aspirations  and  outreachings  of  hu- 
manity, is  the  possessor  of  treasures  that  all 
the  gold  in  Christendom  could  not  purchase. 


RELIG-IDUS   GAMBLING, 


ILL  rightly  organized  society  is  ever  in  a 
chronic  condition  of  civil  war,  where 
the  clashing  of  moral  forces  may  be  heard  on 
every  hand.  It  is  thus  only  that  the  good  is 
made  to  dominate  the  evil.  Otherwise  so- 
ciety would  be  a  neglected  garden,  choked 
with  rank  and  noisome  weeds,  where  the 
flowers  of  beauty  and  harmony,  and  the 
fruits  of  all  ennobling  virtues,  would  find  but 
a  pinched  and  stunted  growth.  In  this  great 
conflict  of  forces  there  are  arrayed  on  one 
side  the  promoters  of  all  human  welfare — 
the  friends  and  conservators  of  all  that  ele- 
vates man  in  the  scale  of  moral,  spiritual  and 
intellectual  being.  On  the  other  are  the 
enemies  of  man's  truest  happiness — and  their 
name  is  legion — who  are  ever  at  work  seek- 
ing to  drag  him  down  nearer  and  nearer  to 
the  primal  types  of  being  whence  it  is  sup- 
posed he  sprung.  The  tiger  of  the  Indian 
jungle  is  not  more  ferocious  and  merciless 
than  are  some  human  tigers  who  fatten  on 


IO2  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

the  blood  of  innocent  souls,  and  who  leave 
mourning  and  desolation  in  their  track. 

In  this  contest  for  the  right  there  is  always 
work  and  room  for  all.  The  Press,  the 
Church,  the  School,  are  usually,  and  ever 
should  be,  the  mighty  Columbiads,  thunder- 
ing the  grand  lessons  of  life  from  the  ram- 
parts of  society.  And  whoever  gives  a  cup 
of  water  to  a  thirsty  traveler,  or  speaks  a 
kind  and  helping  word  to  a  fellow  being  in 
distress,  is  a  private  soldier  in  the  same 
grand  cause.  And  this  is  the  conflict  of  the 
ages — the  warfare  of  the  evermore. 

All  of  which  is  preliminary  to  a  few 
thoughts,  pertinent  or  otherwise,  to  a  gen- 
eral subject  that  has  awakened  no  little  in- 
terest in  every  community,  which  subject 
may  be  expressed  in  the  form  of  a  question, 
thus  :  Is  gambling  for  religious  purposes 
ever  justifiable  ?  In  -no  other  State  in  the 
Union  are  the  inducements  and  temptations 
to  acquire  something  for  nothing  as  great  as 
they  are  in  California.  Gold  and  silver 
mining  is  in  itself  but  little  better  than  a 
game  of  chance.  It  was  so  in  the  early  days 
of  placer  mining,  and  is  more  so  now  in  the 


RELIGIOUS  GAMBLING.  103 

days  of  quartz  mining".  But  that  bears  no 
comparison  with  the  wild  speculative  mania  for 
stock  gambling.  The  miner  puts  in  his  labor, 
and  if  he  won  the  golden  prize  it  was  but 
the  legitimate  fruits  of  that  labor.  The  stock 
gambler  invests  in  his  business  no  honest 
toil,  but  makes  his  money  upon  his  ability  to 
outlie  somebody  else,  This  mad  passion  for 
speculation  is  sapping  the  very  foundations 
of  society.  It  is  wrecking  the  peace  and 
happiness  of  multitudes. 

But  this  is  but  one  manifestation  of  the 
gambling  spirit.  It  has  other  and  darker 
phases — vortexes  into  which  our  young  men 
are  plunging,  and  where  they  will  be  en- 
gulfed forevermore. 

With  this  peril  at  our  doors — a  vice  as 
insidious  as  the  malaria  that  feeds  the  plague 
—ought  not  every  pulpit  and  press  in  the 
land  to  declaim  against  it  ?  Who  can  say 
that  our  laws  prohibiting  gambling  are  unjust, 
or  one  whit  too  severe  ?  Hence  is  it  not 
the  plain  duty  of  every  Christian  man  and 
woman,  and  every  one  who  has  the  welfare 
of  his  fellows  at  heart,  to  strengthen  the  arm 
of  the  law  in  this  behalf,  and  to  unite  in 


IO4  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

creating  and  sustaining  a  public  sentiment  in 
relation  thereto,  that  will  banish  the  vice 
from  our  borders,  or  at  least  drive  it  into  the 
alley  ways  and  secret  corners  of  society, 
where  it  can  no  longer  poison  the  common 
air  we  breathe. 

There  is  no  division  of  sentiment  among* 
thoughtful  people  concerning  the  giant  vices 
and  wrongs  of  the  world.  Murder,  arson, 
theft,  drunkenness — these  overtowering  sins 
find  naught  but  condemnation  in  every  heart. 
But  it  is  the  smaller  and  more  seductive 
vices — fashionable  gambling,  drinking,  social 
dissipation,  etc., — that  "  stir  a  fever  in  the 
blood"  of  society,  and  pave  the  way  for 
those  greater  vices,  to  indulge  in  which  is 
moral  and  physical  death. 

The  Church  often  preaches  against  the 
venality  and  licentiousness  of  the  press  ;  but 
when  the  former  throws  the  mantle  of  its 
sanctity  over  gambling  in  any  form,  it  be- 
comes our  turn  to  preach  the  gospel  of  a 
better  and  purer  morality. 

ONLY  men  who  are  scoundrels  at  heart 
ever  countenance  dishonesty  in  others. 


EENERDSITT, 


^EAL,  downright,  unselfish,  generous 
ISife  natures  ought  to  be  more  numerous 
than  they  are — that  is,  natures  who  can  feel 
an  unselfish  joy  in  the  prosperity  of  others, 
even  though  their  own  lot  may  be  a  hard 
one, — natures  that  can  go  on  foot  and  be 
glad  that  their  neighbors  are  able  to  support 
a  carriage  and  ride  ;  or  who  can  rejoice  that 
others  can  live  in  a  palace,  while  they  can 
afford  only  a  humble  cottage,  and  a  rented 
one  at  that. 

Some  people  are  so  constituted  that  they 
are  happy  only  in  proportion  as  others  are 
miserable  ; — in  other  words,  though  they  may 
possess  a  reasonable  measure  of  wealth  and 
those  external  things  that  are  supposed  by 
many  to  be  wholly  essential  to  happiness, 
their  joy  would  be  dimmed  in  the  presence 
of  one  who  possessed  a  larger  measure  of 
those  same  externals.  They  must  possess 
more  than  their  neighbor,  or  else  the  mean 
little  cross-eyed  demon  of  envy  nestles  in 


IO6  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

their  bosoms  and  robs  them  of  their  peace  of 
mind. 

It  requires  no  great  amount  of  magna- 
nimity of  character  to  be  generous  to  those 
who  are  beneath  us  in  point  of  social  po- 
sition, external  surroundings,  or  in  genuine 
worth  of  soul  ;  but  it  does  really  take  a  large 
nature  to  be  charitably  and  unselfishly  gen- 
erous towards  ostentatious  and  purse-proud 
inferiors — those  whose  only  merit  is  in  the 
husk  and  not  the  kernel. 

We  can  all  be  generous  towards  the  dead. 
Even  those  who  in  life  we  cared  the  least 
for,  and  who  were  least  worthy  of  our  respect, 
call  forth  a  heart-throb  of  sympathy  for  them 
in  their  last  extremity.  It  is  then  we  think 
only  of  their  virtues,  and  even  chide  our- 
selves for  not  being  more  generous  to  their 
imperfections  when  living. 

.What  the  world  most  needs  is  an  order  of 
humanity  that  can  anticipate  death  in  the 
exercise  of  the  nobler  charities — that  does 
not  wait  till  the  pale  specter  sets  its  seal 
upon  the  heart  of  a  fellow  being  to  send  forth 
an  impulse  of  sympathy  in  his  behalf.  The 
world  needs  all  its  generous  impulses  of  kind- 


GENEROSITY.  IOJ 

ness  now,  when  they  will  do  the  most  good. 
The  rich  need  this  baptism  of  generosity  as 
well  as  the  poor,  the  haughty  and  proud  as 
well  as  the  humble. 

It  is  every  individual's  right  and  duty  to 
get  all  out  of  life  that  properly  belongs  to 
him  ;  but  this  he  can  never  do  if  he  troubles 
himself  much  about  what  properly  belongs 
to  others.  He  should  school  himself  in  the 
philosophy  that  all  physical  or  temporal  be- 
longings are  but  the  veriest  dross  and  chaff, 
as  compared  with  the  precious  wealth  of 
genuine  character.  That  alone  is  enduring 
— alone  will  stand  the  racket  of  time  and  the 
wear  of  eternity. 

We  pity  the  man  or  woman,  in  the  enjoy- 
ment of  physical  health,  and  with  sense 
enough  to  think  they  have  good  sense,  who 
can  not  find  hights  and  depths  of  solid  com- 
fort in  this  life,  sufficient  to  establish  a  small 
paradise  of  their  own.  If  they  can  not,  they 
are  souls  sadly  out  of  tune  with  nature — a 
fact  which  they  should  learn  to  realize,  and  if 
possible  to  set  themselves  right  before  they 
become  permanently  incapacitated  for  enjoy- 
ing the  truer  life. 


IO8  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

ILLIBERAL  LIBERALISM, 


IBERALISM,"  so-called,  is  often  but 
another  name  for  the  most  intolerant 
bigotry.  And  nowhere  do  we  find  a  better 
illustration  of  this  fact  than  in  the  contri- 
butions to  the  columns  of  the  chief  organ  of 
Liberalism  in  the  United  States — the  Bcs  on 
Investigator.  The  editorials  of  that  journal 
are  usually  not  seriously  open  to  the  forego- 
ing objection — the  editor  being  naturally  a 
kind-hearted  man,  and  inclined  to  be  con- 
siderate of  the  opinions  of  religionists  — 
quite  as  much,  if  not  more  so  than  many 
religious  editors  are  disposed  to  be  towards 
him  and  his  opinions.  But  some  of  the  In- 
vestigator's  correspondents  are  simply  vicious 
in  their  treatment  of  religious  questions. 
Serenely  anchored  in  their  own  inordinate 
conceit,  and  absolutely  ignorant  of  the  vast 
array  of  psychological  facts  and  experiences 
that  are  entirely  familiar  to  others,  and  have 
been  through  all  the  ages,  they  become 
actually  insolent  in  their  negations  of  the 


ILLIBERAL    LIBERALISM.  IOQ 

world  of  things  the)'  do  not  happen  to  know. 
And  this  they  do  in  the  name  of  Liberalism. 
A  truly  liberal  man  is  never  intolerant  or 
bigoted.  He  is  modest  in  his  doubts,  and 
never  denies  stubbornly.  He  studies  to  un- 
derstand the  reason  of  things,  and  to  fortify 
his  mind  with  arguments — not  so  much  to 
disprove  this  theory  or  strengthen  his  con- 
victions of  the  truth  of  that  ;  but  really  to 
arrive,  if  possible,  at  the  absolute  truth.  He 
seeks  to  find  out  what  nature  means—  not  to 
confirm  what  he  thinks  she  ought  to  mean. 
The  true  Liberalist  will  never  seek  to  dis- 
turb the  serene  faith  of  another  in  religious 
things,  where  such  disturbance  would  tend  to 
seriously  mar  the  happiness  and  peace  of 
mind  of  such  person.  There  are  persons  the 
bent  of  whose  natures,  coupled  with  a  life- 
time of  pious  training,  are  so  deeply  grounded 
in  their  religious  faith — so  sure  that  theirs  is 
the  only  true  way  of  salvation, — that  to  doubt, 
with  them,  would  be  to  so  unsettle  their 
lives  that  the  most  serious  consequences 
would  be  apt  to  follow.  It  is  not  always 
safe  to  attempt  to  soar  on  untrained  wing- 
to  break  loose  fro  n  a  relizious  anchorage 


IIO  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

that  has  been  the  mainstay  of  a"  lifetime.  No 
true  Liberalist  would  recommend  it. 

There  is  good  in  all  religions,  and  much 
that  is  not  religion.  Jew  and  Gentile, 
Christian  and  pagan — all  possess  the  common 
virtues  of  humanity,  and  often  its  worst 
vices.  Many  religious  people  are  no  doubt 
better  men  and  women  because  of  the  re- 
straining influence  of  their  religion.  As  hu- 
manity averages  we  should  very  much  dislike 
to  reside  in  a  community  where  no  such 
restraining  influences  were  felt.  Law  would 
be  powerless  to  protect  life  and  property 
from  the  viciously  inclined.  If  a  man  can 
not  walk  uprightly  and  deal  fairly  with  his 
fellows,  except  through  fear  of  eternal  pun- 
ishment, or  the  hope  of  everlasting  pleasures 
in  another  life,  we  would  encourage  him  in 
that  belief. 

We  have  no  sympathy  with  that  reckless 
and  intolerant  Liberalism  that  would  sweep 
away  with  a  breath  all  the  safeguards  of  re- 
ligion ;  nor  with  that  persecuting  spirit  that 
would  condemn  a  fellow  being  either  because 
of  his  belief,  or  non-belief. 

True   Liberalism   is  gentle  and  charitable, 


SELF-DEPENDENCE.  I  I  I 

and  considerate  of  the  opinions  of  others.  It 
is  the  exclusive  property  of  no  class  of 
thinkers.  It  is  found  in  the  church  and  out 
of  it.  It  belongs  to  all  broad  natures  and 
advanced  souls.  What  the  church  and  the 
world  want  is  more  of  it. 


SELF-DEPENDENCE, 


|HE  greatest  obstacle  in  the  pathway  of 
man's  advancement  to  a  higher  plane  of 
life,  in  all  the  past  ages,  has  been  his  de- 
pendence upon  God,  rather  than  upon  him- 
self. He  has  hoped  and  prayed  and  waited 
for  some  Omnipotent,  Unseen  and  Unknown 
Power  to  do  his  work  for  him — to  pull  him 
out  of  the  slough  of  ignorance,  superstition 
and  natural  cussedness — until  he  has  become 
well  nigh  fossilized.  He  has  watched  the 
clashing  of  moral  forces,  all  along  the  line  of 
history,  and  has  seen  the  world  deluged  in 
blood  and  tears.  He  has  beheld  nations 
struggle  into  existence  and  disappear  in  car- 
nage and  woe.  And  all  this  as  though  he 


112  OUR   SUNDAY    TALKS. 

were  an  idle  spectator  in  the  universe,  never 
dreaming  that  this  was  his  world,  and  that  it 
was  his  especial  business  to  save  it  from 
perdition. 

In  depending  upon  God  to  do  the  work  of 
humanity  we  demonstrate  not  only  our  own 
worthlessness,  but  how  little  we  understand 
the  great  and  Divine  -plan  of  creation.  We 
are  not  the  blind,  unreasoning  instruments, 
in  the  hand  of  Omnipotence,  that  many,  by 
their  works  at  least,  would  have  us  believe. 
We  are  here  for  a  grander  purpose  than  it 
ever  entered  into  the  brain  of  man  to  imagine. 
We  are  here  to  act  as  well  as  to  be  acted 
upon — to  work  out,  in  and  through  ourselves, 
that  truer  life,  that  more  perfect  manhood, 
that  has  been  the  dream  of  the  prophet  and 
the  hope  of  the  sage,  in  all  the  unfolding  ages 
of  the  world's  history. 

The  man  who  prays  to  be  led  "  not  into 
temptation,"  should,  if  not  strongly  enough 
grounded  in  moral  principle  to  resist  tempta- 
tion, keep  out  of  temptation's  way.  He  who 
prays  for  His  "  will  to  be  done  on  earth  as  it 
is  in  Heaven,"  should  endeavor  to  find  out 
what  that  will  is  ;  and,  as  he  expects  God  to 


SELF-DEPENDENCE.  113 

work  through  him,  to  begin  and  do  a  little  of 
the  work  himself,  and  thereby  show  his 
willingness  in  the  matter.  He  should  stop 
crowding  his  neighbor,  and  should  cultivate 
and  practice  the  noble  virtues,  and  set  up  the 
millennium  in  his  own  life  and  character. 
He  who  prays  God  to  give  him  this  day  his 
daily  bread,  should  understand  that  after  all 
his  praying  the  bread  must  come  through  his 
own  effort.  If  not  so  then  there  would 
never  be  such  a  thing  as  starvation  or  famine, 
in  the  world.  What  mockery  of  Divine 
goodness  it  is  to  hear  a  rich  man,  as  he 
gathers  in  his  purse  strings,  pray  to  God 
to  remember  the  widow  and  the  fatherless  in 
their  affliction,  to  clothe  the  naked  'and  feed 
the  hungry.  Why  doesn't  he  go  down  into 
his  pocket  and  do  it  himself?  How  can  he 
expect  God  to  help  the  poor  without  the  use 
of  his  money  ? 

And  so  in  all  that  relates  to  the  welfare  of 
the  race — to  all  social,  political  and  moral 
reforms — to  all  mitigation  of  human  ills — of 
pauperism,  crime,  insanity,  and  the  disordered 
conditions  of  society  and  humanity  of  every 
kind — we  must  quit  leaving  this  work  for 


I  14  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

God  to  do.  If  we  would  have  it  done  at  all 
we  must  take  the  matter  into  our  own  hands. 
For  the  only  way  God  works  in  the  moral 
world  is  through  human  agency. 

We  unhesitatingly  assert  that  the  character 
and  quality  of  the  human  race  are  in  the 
keeping  of  the  race,  and  may  be  made  good, 
bad  or  indifferent,  as  we  will  ;  that  if  we 
should  give  one-half  as  much  time  and  thought 
to  the  uplifting  of  humanity  as  we  do  to 
money-getting,  it  would  not  be  fifty  years 
hence  before  we  should  have  no  use  for 
prisons,  or  insane  asylums  ;  have  no  tramps 
nor  unemployed  laborers  ;  no  squalid  pov- 
erty ;  no  overcrowded  cities,  with  their  vast 
multitudes  of  wretched  and  diseased  human- 
ity ;  no  use  for  armies  or  navies,  with  all 
their  costly  and  barbaric  appendages.  How, 
do  you  ask,  could  all  this  be  accomplished  ? 
Simply  by  humanity  taking  the  matter  into 
their  own  hands,  and  not  waiting  for  Provi- 
dence to  do  the  business  ;  or  rather  by 
allowing  Providence  to  commence  and  carry 
out  the  work  through  them.  There  is  no 
good  reason  why  society — the  better  portion 
thereof — should  not  grapple  with  the  giant 


PIETY  OF  FUN.  I  I  5 

evils  that  beset  the  race,  and  purge  the  world 
thereof.  This  is  by  no  means  as  difficult  a 
task  as  it  might  seem — nothing  like  as  diffi- 
cult as  it  is  to  carry  the  fearful  burdens  we 
now  endure. 


PIETY  DF  FUN, 


SHARADES,  Songs,  Unique  Wax  Fig- 
Si  ures,  Babes  in  the  Woods,  very  amusing 
bottle  performance,  and  other  interesting 
amusements.'  Well,  I  declare,"  remarked 
Spiggles  to  us,  a  few  days  ago,  on  reading 
the  above  list  of  attractions  announced  to 
come  off  at  a  Church  Fair;  4<  the  sheep  and 
the  goats  are  so  near  alike  now-a-days  that  it 
is  difficult  to  tell  where  the  wool  ends  and 
the  hair  begins."  We  were  struck  with  the 
force  of  this  rough-shod  remark,  and  were 
led  to  inquire  why  it  is  that  people  usually 
imagine  that  in  order  to  make  one's  u  calling 
and  election  sure,"  he  must  necessarily  wear 
a  sombre  visage,  shut  himself  out  from  all 
the  enjoyments  of  the  world  and  live  the  life 


Il6  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

of  a  gloomy  ascetic  !  The  old  Calvanistic 
idea  that  makes  future  happiness  attainable 
only  through  groans  and  tears,  and  that  an 
individual  should  be  willing  to  be  damned 

o 

for  the  glory  of  God,  is  fast  fading  from  the 
world.  We  believe  in  the  religion  of  joy, 
and  the  piety  of  innocent  fun,  and  do  not 
think  it  is  fair  that  the  world's  people  should 
have  an  exclusive  patent  to  all  the  good 
things  in  this  life.  Harmony  is  happiness  ; 
and  the  best  homage  that  man  can  render  to 
his  Creator  is  by  living  in  harmony  with  the 
laws  of  his  own  being — doing  good  to  others 
by  lifting  the  lowly  to  higher  planes  of  ex- 
istence, and  continually  reaching  outward 
and  upward  for  something  higher  and  better. 
Entertaining  such  opinions  we  can  see  noth- 
ing in  the  above  bill  of  attractions  inconsistent 
with  true  religion,  neither  could  we  had 
dancing  been  included.  It  was  thus  we  put 
the  case  to  Spiggles,  and  the  young  man 
subsided. 

HE  who  conquers  himself  wins  the  rarest 
and  highest  victory — a  garlanded  hero  he 
from  the  fiercest  battle  ever  fought  and  won. 


RESIGNATION, 


]  HAVE  said— and  I  would  not  recall  the  words, 

Though  all  of  my  future  remain  unblest, 
That  the  pathway  of  thorns  my  feet  have  trod 
Was  for  me  of  all  earthly  ways  the  best. — 

That  the  wrecks  of  my  hopes  that  have  strewn  the 
shore, 

Like  stranded  ships  by  the  storm-spent  sea, 
"Were  argosies  richer  with  precious  store 

Than  all  of  earth's  treasures  were  to  me. 

Had  my  life  been  one  of  indolent  ease — 
Had  fortune  before  me  her  baubles  spread  ; 

And  the  empty  world,  as  I  sought  to  please, 
Had  it  placed  its  emptier  crown  on  my  head, 

Had  the  smiles  of  earth  and  the  bending  skies, 
And  the  pleasures  of  time  that  gladden  and  cloy, 

Had  I  shared  them  all  in  their  fullness  of  sense, 
And  nothing  of  earth  were  there  left  to  enjoy,  — 

Methinks  I  should  then  have  missed  the  prize, 
By  an  infinite  waste  of  barren  years — 

The  gem  in  the  soul's  deep  mine  that  lies, 
And  is  wrought  into  shape  through  toil  and 
tears. 

I  ne'er  should  have  found  the  hidden  ore 
Of  Truth,  whose  marvellous  golden  goal 

Is  only  reached  through  the  drifts  of  life 

By  the  diamond  drill  of  a  chastened  soul. — 


I  I  8  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

The  truth,  that  opens  the  shining  way 
Of  trustful  endurance  forever  more, — 

And  the  pathway  of  duty  is  clearly  lined 

Through  the  rifts  in  the  clouds  to  the  hither 
shore. 

And  thus  have  I  patiently  learned  to  bear 
The  burdens  and  pains  of  life's  unrest, 

Thankful  alike  for  the  storm  and  the  calm, 

And  hopefully  trusting  that  all's  for  the  best. 


GETTING  religion,  with  some  people,  is  a 
good  deal  like  getting  the  measles  or  whoop- 
ing cough.  They  are  taught  that  it  is  some- 
thing that  can  come  to  them  from  without 
only  in  a  peculiar  way,  and  in  a  certain 
attitude  of  body  and  mind  ;  when,  in  fact,  all 
there  is  of  it  of  any  appreciable  use  to  human- 
ity consists  simply  in  ceasing  to  do  evil  and 
learning  to  do  well. 

THE  teacher  who  can  not  call  forth  the 
love  of  his  pupils  is  incapable  of  accomplish- 
ing much  success  in  his  profession.  He  has. 
mistaken  his  calling. 

SELFISHNESS  is  essential  to  good  govern- 
ment and  the  truest  welfare  of  society. 


DUR  ANCESTORS, 


JHE  fact  that  man  possesses  much  of  the 
brute  element  in  his  nature  is  strongly 
indicative  of  his  brute  origin.  In  tracing-  his 
ancestral  line  backward  through  the  ages  of 
his  slow  but  certain  unfoldment  the  thread  is 
lost  in  that  shadowy  prophecy  of  the  race, 
the  huge  prehistoric  savage,  clothed  in  the 
skins  of  wild  beasts  ;  or  stark  beneath 
tropical  suns  ;  with  no  implements  of  art  or 
industry,  no  weapons  of  warfare  save  the 
club  and  stone  ;  a  dweller  in  caves  and  hol- 
low trees  ;  the  companion  of  animals  long 
since  extinct.  Bridging  backwards,  in  imagina- 
tion, a  few  more  aeons  of  time,  and  we  behold 
him  a  magnificent  specimen  of  an  anthropoid 
ape,  walking  erect,  shaggy  and  coarse,  with 
massive  chest  and  jaws,  low  frontal  brain, 
small  pointed  ears,  skull  thick  and  head  broad 
at  the  base,  showing  great  tenacity  of 
life.  What  a  terrible  but  splendid  beast- 
fierce,  ferocious,  wild.  How  he  tyrannizes 
over  his  fellow-beasts — driving  them  from 


I2O  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

their  dens  without  "  due  process  of  law,"  and 
taking  up  his  own  abode  therein — meeting 
his  equals  in  physical  strength  in  fierce  and 
deadly  contests,  and  by  his  greater  cunning, 
entrapping  his  superiors  to  their  destruction. 
The  descendants  of  this  terrible  brute,  in 
whose  nature  was  enfolded  the  germs  of  a 
Shakspere,  a  Milton,  a  Rosa  Bonheur  and  an 
Alice  Gary,  have  brought  down  with  them 
many  of  their  ancestral  traits.  And  it  is  to 
this  fact  we  are  indebted  for  all  the  inhar- 
mony  and  wretchedness  that  exist  in  the 
world.  It  is  the  wild  beast  in  human  nature 
that  prompts  the  strong  to  oppress  the  weak, 
that  withholds  the  needed  sympathy  from 
the  poor  and  unfortunate — the  exercise  of 
ever  blessed  charity  from  the  erring.  It  is 
the  unsubdued  ancestral  element  in  man — the 
outcroppings  of  his  prehistoric  brute  nature, 
when  he  contended  with  other  brutes  for  a 
bone,  that  prompts  him  now  to  take  advan- 
tage of  his  fellows  in  a  bargain  ;  to  grind  one 
and  a  half  per  cent  a  month  out  of  a  poor 
man  struggling  to  save  his  little  home  from 
the  exactions  of  the  law  ;  to  gather  to  himself 
riches  at  the  expense  of  honor  ;  to  betray  a 


OUR   ANCESTORS.  121 

friend  ;  to  tyrannize  over  a  wife  ;  to  lead 
astray  the  young  and  confiding  ;  to  steal  and 
lie  and  murder  ;  in  short  to  live  a  life  that  is 
at  war  with  that  truer  life  that  comes  only 
through  man's  unfoldment  upon  the  higher 
spiritual  and  intellectual  planes  of  his  ex- 
istence. 

As  the  brain  of  man  becomes  finer  and 
more  spiritualized,  overarching  the  animal 
and  intellectual  life,  the  meanness  of  his 
nature  gradually  disappears.  A  deep  sense 
of  justice,  and  a  feeling  of  divine  harmony 
and  good  will  to  man,  take  the  place  of  that 
cruel  selfishness  that  works  but  to  mar  and 
destroy.  The  man  drifts  farther  and  farther 
away  from  the  crude  conditions  in  which 
recorded  history  first  found  him,  and  comes 
nearer  and  nearer  into  the  likeness  of  that 
ideal  manhood  which  shall  yet  fill  the  earth 
in  "  the  good  time  coming." 

To  eliminate  the  crude,  the  coarse,  the 
animal,  and  take  on  the  pure,  the  good,  the 
beautiful,  should  be  the  end  and  aim  of  every 
individual  soul.  Some  there  are  who  are 
seeking  for  the  best  in  their  own  lives  and 
characters,  and  they  are  "  the  salt  of  the 


122  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

earth  "  —the   leaven  that  shall  yet  permeate 
and  reconstruct  the  whole. 

If  we  only  realized  the  help  we  might  be 
to  those  less  favored  than  ourselves,  by  the 
exercise  of  our  best  sympathies  and  charities 
toward  them — by  the  encouraging  and  kindly 
spoken  word — by  the  manifestation  of  a 
heartfelt  interest  in  their  welfare — by  the 
radiation  of  that  sweet  influence  divine  which 
'every  soul  has  the  power  to  impart — how 
rapidly  would  wrong,  discord  and  unhappi- 
ness  disappear  from  the  earth.  Is  it  not 
worth  trying  ? 


IF  the  tradesman  who  seeks  your  custom 
under  the  pretext  that  he  is  selling  you 
goods  at  less  than  cost,  while  at  the  same 
time  he  makes  a  reasonable  profit  thereon,— 
and  the  customer  who  takes  advantage  of 
another's  necessities  to  pay  less  for  an  article 
than  it  is  worth, — were  shaken  in  a  bag 
together,  it  would  be  hard  to  tell  which 
would  come  out  first. 

THE  use  of  tobacco  and  whisky  should  be 
regarded  as  justifiable  grounds  for  divorce. 


ORGANIZATION 


[RGANIZATION  is  the  secret  of  all 
success  in  life.  It  is  the  basis  of  all 
social  order — of  all  national  prosperity.  In 
the  church,  the  home,  the  state,  it  is  the 
keystone  of  the  arch — the  chief  pillar  of  the 
temple.  Wherever  it  is  not  chaos  reigns 
and  the  uncontrolled  elements  run  riot  through 
the  fields  of  space. 

Nature  sets  us  an  example  of  organization 
in  all  her  works.  We  see  it  in  the  matchless 
mechanism  of  the  universe, — in  the  harmo- 
nious movement  of  the  planets  that  sweep 
around  our  sun, — in  the  mighty  aggregation 
of  waters  that  enfold  our  earth, — in  the  ebb 
and  flow  of  the  tides, — in  the  changes  of  the 
seasons, — in  the  mystic  temple  of  the  human 
soul, — in  the  marvellous  mystery  of  animal 
life, — in  the  growth  of  a  blade  of  grass.  All 
is  thoroughly  organized,  and  evidently  mov- 
ing forward  to  a  purpose,  whose  ultimate 
staggers  conception  with  its  possibilities. 


124  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

And  it  is  from  this  example  man  should 
take  the  hint.  He  will,  if  he  is  wise.  He 
will  treasure  the  many  lessons  that  nature 
teaches  him,  and  profit  himself  therein.  The 
truest  knowledge  that  can  come  to  a  young" 
man  or  woman  is  that  of  knowing  what  they 
are  here  for,- — for  what  world  of  use  and 
work  they  were  intended — for  what  they  are 
best  fitted  to  succeed  in.  It  is  a  painful  fact 
that  this  knowledge  comes  to  but  compara- 
tively few.  Hence  the  wrecks  of  humanity 
we  see  all  around  us. 

Young  people,  in  their  immature  ideas  of 
lite  and  unstable  convictions  of  duty,  are  apt 
—to  borrow  a  phrase  from  the  glossary  of 
the  sportsman — to  "scatter  "  too  much.  They 
dabble  in  many  things,  but  in  nothing  per- 
sistently and  permanently.  They  have  not 
found  out  what  they  are  here  for,  or  if  they 
have,  they  have  net  learned  the  art  of  or- 
ganizing and  concentrating  their  faculties 
upon  the  central  purpose  of  their  lives.  The 
man  without  a  hobby  of  some  sort  is  really  of 
but  little  use  in  the  world.  He  must  have  an 
object  in  life,  around  which  all  his  energies 
must  gather,  to  bear  him  onward  to  success. 


)RGANIZATION  [  2  = 

It  is  better  to  be  a  good  blacksmith  than  a 
poor  editor  or  teacher — an  artist  in  kalso- 
mine  or  whitewash,  than  a  dauber  on  can- 
vas. 

Thus,  in  our  individual  natures  we  see  the 
necessity  for  organization — the  highest  and 
truest  organization — the  organization  that 
supplements  and  underlies  all  other  organiza- 
tions— the  complete  organization  of  the  in- 
dividual man.  That  no  man  is  fit  to  govern 
others  who  has  not  first  learned  how  to 
govern  himself  is  a  truism  requiring  no  argu- 
ment. No  man  is  fit  to  lead  an  army,  or 
direct  any  great  enterprise,  who  has  not  his 
own  faculties  well  in  hand.  Hence,  whether 
with  individual  or  co-operative  effort,  the 
principle  is  the  same  ;  there  must  be  a  con- 
centration offerees,  working  to  a  specific  end. 

I  want  to  emphasize  and  impress  this  idea 
upon  the  minds  and  consciences  of  all  young 
people.  In  the  best  light  of  your  own  in- 
telligence and  judgment,  settle  down  upon 
some  fixed  line  of  action — upon  some  life 
work — and  then  bend  all  your  faculties,  all 
the  forces  of  your  natures,  in  that  direction. 
Do  not  conclude  hastily,  but  when  your  con- 


126  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

elusions  are  once  formed,  do  not  swerve  from 
the  end  in  view  by  so  much  as  a  hair's 
breadth,  Resolve  upon  success.  No  mat- 
ter what  obstacles  stand  in  the  way,  go  at 
them  with  a  resolute  will,  and  surmount  them, 
or  die  trying. 

This  is  the  secret  of  success  in  life,  in  any 
and  every  department  of  human  action. 

Promiscuous  novel  reading,  the  frivolities 
of  fashion,  and  of  that  addle-brained  humbug 
called  society,  the  many  enticements  to  idle 
ness  and  uselessness,  all  combine  to  unsettle 
the  minds  of  young  persons,  and  unfit  them 
for  that  rigorous  application  necessary  to 
enable  them  to  climb  the  shining  bights  of 
success. 

O,  yes,  it  is  nice  to  dance  and  play,  and 
have  a  jolly  time — nice  to  fritter  away  the 
golden  hours  of  life's  sunny  morning,  like  a 
butterfly  basking  in  the  glamour  of  the  new 
born  day  ;  but  ah,  there  comes  a  time  when 
you  must  needs  grapple  with  the  stern  reali- 
ties of  existence,  when  the  battle  of  life  will 
open  out  before  you,  and  when  you  will  need 
large  resources  of  character  to  tide  you  over 
life's  rough  places. 


PASSING  DN, 


"  Leaves  have  their  time  to  fall, 

And  flowers  to  wither  at  the  north  wind's  breath, 

And  stars  to  set,  but  all — 

Thou  hast  all  seasons  for  thine  own,  0,  Death." 

SHERE  is  no  religion  however  true,  or 
sincerely  believed  in  ;  no  philosophy 
however  consoling,  that  can  fully  reconcile 
us  to  death.  To  those  of  us  with  whom  faith 
is  supplemented  by  the  absolute  knowledge 
of  the  spirit's  existence  beyond  the  confines 
of  this  mortal  life,  and  who,  if  any,  are 
possessed  of  a  philosophy  that  should  soothe, 
and  comfort,  and  sustain  us  in  the  trying 
hour  when  our  loved  ones  pass  over  the  dark 
river — to  us,  even,  death  has  a  nameless 
dread.  Our  hearts  rebel  against  it,  and  we 
ofttimes  refuse  to  be  comforted.  Especially 
is  this  true  when  death  lays  its  chilling  hand 
upon  the  young — upon  the  children  of  our 
love. 

The  gray-haired  sire,  who  has  lived  his 
allotted  years,  and  fulfilled  his  mission  on 
earth,  may  sink  to  sleep  in  Nature's  enfolding 


[28  DUR  SUNDAY    TALKS 

arms  as  calmly  and  sweetly  as  the  tired 
babe  is  lulled  to  rest  upon  its  mother's 
breast.  We  are  prepared,  in  a  measure,  for 
death  when  it  comes  in  the  fullness  of  time 
to  the  aged.  Reason  then  teaches  us  to  ac- 
cept it  as  a  wise  fulfillment  of  law.  And  if 
such  an  one  has  lived  wisely,  made  good  use 
of  himself,  and  left  the  world  better  than  he 
found  it,  we  know  that  death  to  him  is  a  glo- 
rious translation  to  a  higher  life  ;  that  with 
his  treasured  wealth  of  character  he  will  be 
fully  prepared  for  the  fellowship  of  those 
shining  ones  that  live  just  beyond  the  veil. 

But  when  death  comes  to  the  child,  or  to 
the  young  man  just  entering  upon  the  busy 
scenes  of  life,  it  has  a  much  sadder  aspect. 
And  yet  there  is  a  consolation  in  this  thought  : 
Nature  aims  to  complete  whatever  she  un- 
dertakes. The  human  spirit  once  individual- 
ized and  started  on  its  long  journey,  will  be 
taken  care  of,  never  fear.  If  it  fail  of  ob- 
taining its  proper  measure  of  earthly  ex- 
perience, we  doubt  not  ways  and  means  will 
be  provided  for  its  securing  what  will  be 
equivalent  to  such  experiences  elsewhere. 
Nature  is  ample  in  her  resources.  She  is  a 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


PASSING  ON         ^aMi-wru^^on 

gentle  and  impartial  mother,  and,  in  time  or 
eternity,  will,  we  believe,  give  her  children 
all  a  fair  start  on  the  road  to  happiness.  The 
journey  may  be  longer  for  some  than  for 
others,  but  it  will  lead  to  the  same  blissful 
home  in  the  vast  and  eternal  Beyond.  Some 
may  tread  the  thorny  path  of  sorrow  with 
bleeding  feet — be  hampered  and  surrounded 
by  physical  conditions  that  impede  the  spirit's 
growth — but  our  loving  Mother  understands 
all  that.  She  knows  that  we  are  not  always 
responsible  for  what  we  are — that  our  natures 
at  best  are  but  inherited — have  come  down 
to  us  through  an  ancestry  that  reaches  away 
back  into  infinity.  She  realizes  the  tempta- 
tions and  trials  through  which  we  must  needs 
pass — the  physical  infirmities  and  diseases  to 
which  we  are  subject.  She  has  an  infinity  of 
ways,  an  infinity  of  room  and  an  infinity  of 
time  in  which  to  perform  her  work.  And 
we  doubt  not  she  will  do  it  well. 

Then  may  we  not  hope  that  death  is  but 
the  passing  on  to  another  stage  of  existence  ; 
that  the  spirit,  unable  to  cope  with  its  earthly 
conditions,  breaks  its  mortal  bonds  and  is 
borne  away  to  the  companionship  of  loved 


I  30  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

ones  gone  before  ;  that  there  the  child  will 
find  gentle  protection  and  tender  care  ;  the 
misguided  and  erring,  wise  counselors  and 
true  and  loving  friends  ?  Removed  from  the 
besetting  temptations  and  surroundings  of 
earth,  may  it  not  be  that  the  real  work  of 
growth  will  begin,  and  be  carried  forward,  by 
a  law  of  eternal  progress,  to  a  full  and  happy 
fruition  ? 

Could  we  inquire  of  our  loved  ones  passed 
to  the  hither  shore,  "  How  is  it  with  thee  ?" 
and  could  we  hear  the  answer  they  would 
send  back  to  us  from  their  spirit  home,  we 
doubt  not  that  answer  would  be,  "  All  is 
well."  They  would  tell  us  that  they  rejoiced 
that  their  earth  life  was  over,  and  their  sor- 
rows and  sufferings  at  an  end.  They  would 
send  back  words  of  greeting  to  the  loved 
ones  left  behind.  They  would  urge  us  to  be 
patient  and  trusting  to  the  end,  discharging 
every  known  duty  to  ourselves  and  to  our 
fellow  beings.  They  would  assure  us  that 
when  at  last  our  earthly  pilgrimage  should  be 
o'er,  they  would  be  there  to  give  us  a  joyous 
welcome  to  their  home  in  the  beautiful  Sum 
mer  Land, 


DON'T, 

jON'T  be  selfish,  or  mean,  or  narrow- 
minded — if  you  can  help  it.  Don't 
consider  it  your  duty  to  be  a  common  carrier 
for  any  sort  of  scandal.  Don't  trifle  with 
those  you  love,  nor  tread  on  the  heart  of  a 
friend.  Don't  meddle  with  other  people's 
business.  Don't  think  evil  of  any  one,  even 
of  those  you  do  not  like.  The  world  is  wide 
enough  for  all — leave  them  alone.  Don't 
try  to  pull  down  those  above  you  ;  but 
always  seek  to  lift  those  beneath  you  up  to 
your  level.  Don't  make  yourself  disagreeable 
to  any  one,  simply  because  you  know  how. 
Don't  yield  servile  submission  to  tobacco, 
whisky,  or  any  other  debasing  habit  ;  but 
have  manhood  and  womanhood  enough  to  be 
decent  and  wholesome,  and  masters  of  your 
own  bodies.  Don't  be  contented  with  empti- 
ness of  heart  or  brain  ;  but  cultivate  the 
gentle  amenities  of  life,  arid  store  your  mind 
with  useful  knowledge.  Don't  be  suspicious 
of  others  who  are  just  as  good  as  you  are, 
and  perhaps  a  little  better,  Don't  be  a  fool. 


132  )UR  SUNDAY  TALKS 

WHAT  DF  THE  NIGHT? 


[ATCHMAN,  what  of  the  night?  Do 
the  heavens  indicate  fair  weather  or 
foul,  for  the  coming  day  ?  In  short,  what 
are  the  signs  of  the  times  ? 

There  has  never  been  a  period  in  the 
world's  history  when  such  general  and  wide- 
spread unrest  prevailed  in  the  minds  of  men 
as  at  the  present  time.  The  deep  sea  of 
human  thought  seems  lashed  into  mountain 
waves  that  break  and  foam  along  the  rocky 
shores  of  time,  undermining  and  overturning 
many  a  consecrated  monument  of  tradition 
that  but  recently  seemed  as  impregnable  as 
the  everlasting  hills.  With  the  modern  lib- 
erty and  license  of  thought  no  subject  is  too 
sacred  for  investigation  ;  and  many  of  the 
profoundest  thinkers  of  the  world  are  to-day 
found  peering  into  the  most  sacred  places — 
into  venerated  crypts  and  sanctuaries,  where 
never  before  profane  eye  has  dared  to  pene- 
trate. Religion  is  undergoing  a  change  as 
marvelous  as  the  birth  of  a  world.  Science 


WHAT  OF    THE    NIGHT  f  133 

is  divesting  it  of  its  crudities  and  inconsisten- 
cies, and  reason  is  adding  to  and  adorning  it 
with  more  and  more  rational  interpretations. 

In  the  civil  and  political  world,  likewise, 
we  find  agitation  and  commotion  everywhere 
manifest.  As  thought  begins  to  permeate 
the  mass  of  mind,  convulsion  and  revolution 
follow  ;  and  old  and  long  tried  forms  of 
government  are  being  subjected  to  ordeals  as 
crucial  as  the  judgment  of  the  ages.  Our 
own  republican  institutions  were  never  sub- 
jected to  so  severe  a  strain  ;  and,  in  fact,  to 
the  minds  of  many  of  our  political  econo- 
mists, the  question  of  the  ability  of  a  mixed 
and  heterogeneous  people  to  govern  them- 
selves is  by  no  means  clear.  Well  may  they 
ask,  If  the  ignorant  and  down-trodden  masses 
of  the  Old  World  are  incapable  of  self-gov- 
ernment, in  their  own  countries,  as  they 
doubtless  are,  wherein  does  that  incapacity 
cease  upon  their  translation  to  our  shores  ? 

Here,  too,  after  a  century  of  growth  and 
prosperty,  we  find  ourselves  confronted  by 
new  and  undreamed  of  obstacles  in  the  shape 
of  an  unemployed,  useless  and  unnecessary 
humanity — of  muscle  supplemented  by  ma- 


I  34  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

chinery — of  strange  phases  of  oppression — all 
complicated  factors  in  the  problem  of  self- 
government,  the  solution  of  which  is  yet 
involved  in  much  uncertainty. 

And  then  in  the  social  world  we  find  a  very 
maelstrom  of  agitation,  with  threatening 
thunder-bolts  all  around  the  sky.  Inharmony 
in  marital  life  is  peopling  the  world  with  dis- 
cordant and  murderous  elements,  fatal  to  the 
truest  welfare  of  society.  Divorces,  which  in 
past  ages  were  almost  unknown,  have  come 
to  number  nearly  one-third  the  marriages. 
Our  prisons  and  insane  asylums  are  over- 
flowing with  diseased  and  disordered  human- 
ity as  the  fruits  of  this  inharmony  ;  while  our 
great  cities  swarm  with  multitudes  of  badly 
•organized,  wretched  and  half-starved  beings 
whose  presence  in  the  world  is  a  calamity 
and  a  curse,  and  who  never  should  have  been 
suffered  to  exist. 

What  means  all  this  commotion  ?  Is  the 
world ,  growing  worse,  and  is  our  civilization 
a  failure  ?  Perhaps  the  latter,  in  a  measure, 
but  surely  not  the  former.  Never  was  the 
world  so  blessed  with  grand,  enlightened  men 
and  women  as  now — never  such  an  array  of 


WHAT    OF    THE  NIGHT?  135 

noble  thinkers,  philosophers  or  scholars. 
While  each  former  age  has  produced  its  few, 
this  has  produced  its  multitude.  Out  of 
the  clashing  and  chaos  of  human  affairs  are 
evolving  nobler  types  of  manhood  and 
womanhood  than,  with  rare  exceptions,  any 
that  history  records.  For  amid  all  the  in- 
harmony  of  the  world  there  are  divine  har- 
monies radiating  and  orbing  all,  along  the 
lines  of  which  some  souls  are  mounting  to 
sublimer  hights  of  goodness  and  power  ;  and 
thus  is  each  age  a  step  in  advance  of  the  pre- 
ceding one,  and  in  each  we  behold  the  proph- 
ecy of  a  better  age  to  come. 


THE  whisperer  of  scandal,  or  the  carrier  of 
gossip,  leaves  a  slimier  track  than  a  poisoned 
reptile — pollutes  the  fair,  beautiful  world 
around  with  a  blast  deadlier  than  the  "  red- 
hot  lipped  simoon." 

IT  is  the  duty  of  Society,  as  far  as  possible, 
to  remove  all  temptation  to  a  dissolute  life 
from  the  reach  of  those  who  lack  the  moral 
firmness  to  resist  its  vitiating  and  seductive 
influence. 


136  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

ACROSS  THE  BAR, 

Inscribed  to  the  Memory  of  Capt.  Francis  Connor,  late  of 
the  steamship  Oregon,  plying  between  San  Fran- 
cisco and  Portland,  Oregon. 

SHIP  sailed  out  to  an  unknown  sea, 

Bound  for  a  shadowy  port  afar  ; 
Out  where  the  waves  of  death  run  high, 

It  sinks  from  our  sight  across  the  bar  ; — 
Across  where  the  hidden  breakers  lie, 

And  the  dangerous  reefs  of  time  enfold 
Full  many  a  ship  with  its  treasures  rare, 

And  many  a  noble  seaman  bold. 

It  bears  away  from  oar  saddened  gaze, 

And  the  hearts  and  home  of  his  earthly  love, 
The  form  of  a  sailor  true  and  brave, 

From   the  shores  of  earth  to  the  realm  above. 
His  barque  is  freighted  with  noble  deeds, 

And  generous  thoughts  for  all  mankind, 
And  from  his  soul  o'er  the  water  speeds 

A  prayer  for  the  loved  ones  left  behind. 

And  here  by  the  wave-washed  shore  we  stand 

Where  the  tides  eternally  ebb  and  flow, 
Watching  our  ships  go  out  to  sea, 

Bearing  our  fondest  hopes  below. 
But  by  faith  we  see  the  beckoning  hand 

Of  angels  reaching  across  the  bar, 
To  welcome  our  loved  ones  over  the  strand, 

To  the  shining  way  with  its  "  gate  ajar." 

NOTE  .  The  Bar  at  the  mouth  of  the  Columbia  Kiver  is  regarded 
as  the  most  dangerous  of  any  upon  the  Pacific  Coast,  Capt. 
Connor  was  noted  for  his  skill  in  making  the  passage. 


ACT  WELL  YDUR  FART, 


[UR  happiness  in  this  life  depends  not 
so  much  on  circumstances  or  surround- 
ings, as  in  our  determined  efforts  to  do  our 
best  in  all  conditions  in  which  we  are 
placed.  Our  common  heritage  is  more  or 
less  allied  to  sorrow  and  pain,  but  we  have 
within  ourselves  the  antidote  of  heart-sun- 
shine that  will  alleviate,  if  not  remove  many 
of  our  troubles.  But  we  persistently  reject 
the  means  of  happiness  that  lie  within  our 
reach,  by  ignoring  present  small  pleasures,  in 
hopes  of  enjoying  greater  ones  in  the  future 
good  time  coming,  which  always  keeps  just 
ahead,  and  is  therefore  unattainable.  We 
cultivate  little  cares  till  they  sometimes  attain 
enormous  growth,  by  constantly  dwelling  on 
them  and  dolefully  rehearsing  them  to  our 
friends,  when  we  should  do  our  best  to  try  to 
rise  above  them.  In  the  most  difficult  and 
trying  conditions  there  will  often  be  a  bright 
side,  which,  if  seized  upon,  will  lead  one 
straight  out  of  tangled  paths  into  the  light  ; 


138  OUR    SUNDAY   TALKS. 

and  it  is  well  to  bear  this  continually  in  mind, 
"  Act  well  your  part,  there  all  the  honor  lies." 

WHAT  WE  DIFFER  ABOUT, 


iHERE  are  really  but  few  'points  of 
difference  between  honest  men  in  mat- 
ters essential  to  human  happiness,  here  or 
hereafter.  They  all  mean  right,  no  matter  of 
what  creed  or  of  no  creed — Christian,  Jew, 
pagan,  or  heathen  ;  infidel  or  atheist.  It  is 
usually,  in  fact  we  may  say  always,  of  those 
things  which  men  know  the  least,  and  of 
which  little  or  nothing1  can  ever  be  known, 
that  they  differ  and  wrangle  about  the  most 
and  loudest.  They  can  readily  agree  in  their 
opinions  upon  what  they  really  know,  or 
upon  principles  of  right  and  justice.  Who- 
ever asserts  that  it  is  wrong  to  steal,  or  bear 
false  witness,  will  find  no  opponents  "among 
honest  men.  Definitions  of  right  and  wrong 
really  vary  but  little  with  enlightened  minds  ; 
and  there  will  be  found  to  be  a  hundred 


WHAT    WE    DIFFER    ABOUT.  139 

points  of  agreement  between  them  to  one  of 
•disagreement. 

It  is  about  the  essential  things  of  life,  con- 
cerning which  men  can  best  agree,  that 
make  society  pleasant  and  prpmotive  of  the 
truest  happiness  to  its  individual  members. 
This  common  level  of  social  life  should  be 
•clearly  defined  in  every  mind,  leaving  the 
individual  at  liberty  to  traverse  the  byways 
and  jungles  of  thought  unmolested.  In  other 
words,  we  should  learn  to  agree  in  those 
matters  which  best  conserve  the  common 
good,  and  be  willing  to  disagree  in  all  things 
else.  Common  courtesy  should  teach  us  to 
be  considerate  and  respectful  of  the  opinions 
of  others,  however  they  may  differ  from  our 
own.  I  )ogmatism  is  always  something  to  be 
deprecated  as  unworthy  a  noble  mind.  It  is 
really  indicative  of  ignorance.  It  is  never  so 
pronounced  as  with  small  and  uncultured 
minds.  For  one  to  assert  positively  that  he 
is  right  and  his  neighbor  wrong,  concerning 
what  neither  of  them  knows  anything  about, 
is  as  absurd  as  for  two  blind  men  to  fall  out 
concerning  the  nature  of  light.  And  yet 
there  have  been  more  bruised  hearts  and 


I4O  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

broken  heads  growing  out  of  just  such  dog- 
matic assertion  than  the  world  has  any  idea  of. 
But  we  rejoice  that  the  world  is  growing 
wiser  in  this  respect.  Good  men  and  women 
of  any  sect,  or  of  no  sect,  look  so  much 
alike  in  dress  and  general  appearance,  now-a- 
days,  and  are  so  much  alike  in  manner  and 
purpose,  that  no  one  can  distinguish  the  dif- 
ference, even  if  any  such  difference  existed. 
Men  no  longer  wear  their  faith  upon  their 
sleeves — in  the  cut  of  their  coats  or  color  of 
their  neckties — but  in  their  hearts  and  lives. 
We  judge  of  them  by  other  standards  of  value 
than  by  their  professions  of  creeds,  or  the 
length  of  their  faces  on  Sunday.  No  amount 
of  piety,  that  is  not  well  flanked  and  sup- 
ported by  good  deeds,  will  any  longer  save 
a  man  in  the  eyes  of  the  church  or  the  world. 
Enlightened  thought  everywhere  has  come 
to  regard  goodness  as  very  much  of  one 
quality,  no  matter  by  whom  practiced.  This 
is  as  it  should  be.  It  shows  that  the  world  is 
unfolding  in  the  right  direction.  It  is  a 
prophecy  of  the  coming  time  when  the  com- 
mon plane  of  thought  will  be  so  broad  that 
there  will  be  but  little  room  for  side  issues, 


VALUE    OF    RICHES.  14! 

and  when  such  differences  of  opinion  as  we 
may  have  will  be  so  insignificant  compara- 
tively as  scarcely  to  create  a  ripple  on  the 
deep  sea  of  thought. 

The   world   will  become   wiser  and  better 
just  as  fast  as  we  are  willing  that  it  should,— 
whenever  we  are  ready  to  "  pool  our  issues  " 
and  unite  in  a  common  purpose  for  the  com- 
mon good. 


VALUE   DF  RICHES, 


HAT  is  he  worth  ? "  is  a  question  often 
asked  with  reference  to  the  financial 
standing  of  some  man  before  the  world — as 
though  the  all  in  all  of  value  embraced  in  the 
word  "  what  "  consisted  of  houses  and  lands,  of 
a  huge  rent-roll,  a  vast  accumulation  of  Gov- 
ernment bonds  and  a  plethoric  bank  ac- 
count. There  are,  however,  other  and  in- 
finitely higher  standards  of  value  for  deter- 
mining the  real  genuine  worth  of  a  man, 
which  are  seldom  taken  into  the  account — 


142  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

standards  as  much  above  those  of  a  money- 
consideration  as  the  star-gemmed  sky  is  above 
the  desert  of  Sahara. 

What  is  he  worth  ?  4<  Well,  they  say  he 
is  worth  a  million — two  millions — five  mil- 
lions." Is  that  all?  "All?  What  would 
you  have  more?"  Everything  more.  His. 
millions  are  but  the  veriest  dross  and  rags, 
without  some  golden  stores  of  manhood  be- 
hind them — some  sparkling  diamonds  of 
sterling  character — to  back  them  up  with,, 
and  utilize  them  for  his  own  highest  good, 
and  the  welfare  of  his  fellows. 

Take  your  average  millionaire — your 
Stewarts,  Vanderbilts,  Astors, — how  did  they 
acquire  their  vast  possessions  of  earthly 
treasure  ?  By  the  exercise  of  a  greedy  ac- 
quisitiveness that  was  deaf  to  every  voice  of 
humanity  ;  by  the  rise  in  property  values 
caused  by  the  labor  of  others  ;  by  the  thumb- 
screws of  usury  on  the  humble  homes  and 
holdings  of  the  poor  ;  by  purchased  favorit- 
ism in  legislation  and  law  ;  by  oppression, 
extortion  and  tyranny  ;  in  short,  by  the 
crushing  out  in  their  own  souls  of  every  noble 
and  generous  impulse,  and  the  development 


VALUE     DF    RICHES.  143 

of  a  selfishness  as  hard  and  cruel  as  "  the 
pestilenc'e  that  walketh  in  darkness,"  or  the 
hungry  wolf  of  famine  that  gnaws  at  the 
vitals  of  the  poor.  What  are  such  men 
worth  ?  They  are  worth  the  lime  in  their 
bones,  the  iron  in  their  blood,  the  carbon  and 
oxygen  in  their  fat  and  muscles — they  are 
worth  the  elements  which  they  received  from 
generous  Nature  to  piece  out  their  physical 
organisms.  And  when  Nature  receives  back 
her  own,  as  she  is  sure  to  in  the  end,  she 
doubtless  feels,  if  she  reasons,  as  did  the  poor 
parson  whose  hat  was  circulated  among  a 
parsimonious  audience  for  contributions,  but 
which  was  returned  empty — he  thanked  the 
Lord  that  his  hat  had  been  returned  to  him. 
So  will  Nature  thank  God  that  she  has  re- 
ceived back  her  raw  material  for  a  man,  and 
will  seek  to  make  a  better  investment  the 
next  time. 

Except  in  cases  of  inherited  or  accidental 
wealth,  we  hold  that  it  is  only  by  the  exercise 
of  the  baser  faculties  of  the  mind  that  large 
possessions  can  be  acquired.  If  acquired  in 
the  ordinary  business  pursuits  of  life,  it  must 
necessarily  be  by  taking  undue  advantage  of 


[44  ^UR  SUNDAY    TALKS 

others.  For  no  man,  by  his  own  hands,  or  a 
fair  use  of  the  labor  of  other  hands,  can  hon- 
estly amass  much  more  than  a  fair  competency  ; 
or  than,  if  reasonably  liberal  and  mindful  of  the 
interests  of  others,  will  secure  for  him  a 
comfortable  old  age.  This  proposition  is 
self-evident. 

He  who  adds  nothing  to  the  sum  total  of 
human  happiness  ;  who  bears  no  burden 
cheerfully  ;  who  aggregates  to  himself  riches 
and  power  but  to  oppress  ;  who  assuages  no 
sorrow  and  wipes  away  no  tear  ;  but  lives 
the  life  of  the  horse  leech  and  sponge,  blesses 
the  world  only  in  his  "taking  off."  Of  his 
earthly  substance  we  may  erect  costly  mon- 
uments to  his  memory  ;  but  what  a  stu- 
pendous sarcasm  !  Who  would  not  rather 
live  in  the  cherished  thoughts  of  a  grateful 
posterity,  enshrined  in  the  souls  of  those  he 
had  lived  to  bless  and  ennoble,  than  wear 
another  Cheops  above  his  useless  dust  ? 

No,  a  thousand  times  no  ;  riches  do  not 
constitute  the  all  of  worth.  The  brave,  true 
soul,  that  patiently  and  faithfully  fills  his 
allotted  place  in  life,  shedding  upon  all  around 
the  aroma  of  generous  deeds  ;  with  ever  a 


CALLOUSED    SYMPATHIES,  145 

helping  hand  and  an  encouraging  word  for  a 
struggling  brother — though  he  may  be  empty 
of  purse  and  scrip,  and  "  have  not  where  to 
lay  his  head,"  is,  nevertheless,  the  possessor 
of  treasures  that  a  Croesus  might  envy.  For 
such  a  soul  there  is  no  death.  It  shines  out 
brighter  and  brighter  with  the  ages. 


CALLOUSED   SYMPATHIES. 


iHE  present  anamalous  condition  of  so- 
ciety, with  its  constant  and  extra  de- 
mands upon  the  charitable  for  the  relief  of 
the  laborless  and  destitute,  is  no  doubt  work- 
ing a  baneful  influence  upon  the  hearts  and 
consciences  of  the  benevolent,  in  drying  up 
the  fountains  of  their  charities,  and  making 
them  as  hard  and  heartless  as  the  skinflints  of 
society,  whose  hearts  were  never  warmed 
with  a  generous  impulse.  The)'  are  over- 
burdened with  the  sorrows  and  necessities 
of  others,  until  the}'  are  inclined  to  rebel  in 
spirit  against  the  whole  business,  and  as  a 


146  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

matter  of  self-protection  close  their  hearts 
and  their  purses  to  the  piteous  pleadings  of  the 
poor.  Thus  are  they  becoming  calloused  to 
those  tender  sympathies  and  gentle  humani- 
ties which  lift  man  above  the  hard,  cold  level 
of  unfeeling  and  unsympathetic  selfishness. 

This  condition  of  things  is  greatly  to  be 
deplored  ;  for  whatever  may  happen  to  the 
race,  it  can  not  afford  to  lose  any  of  its  good 
qualities.  It  has  none  to  spare.  On  the 
other  hand  it  ought  to  be  making  a  sure  and 
steady  advance  on  the  road  to  righteousness, 
by  cultivating  every  virtue  and  laying  in  a 
good  stock  of  character  for  the  time  to  come. 
We  do  not  think  a  man  can  well  have  too 
much  of  humanity  about  him — too  much 
of  charity  for  the  misfortunes  and  wretched- 
ness of  his  fellow  beings.  At  the  same  time 
he  owes  a  duty  to  himself,  and  in  the  be- 
stowal of  his  charities  he  should  do  so  within 
the  bounds  of  reason,  and  not  allow  the 
exercise  of  his  generous  impulses  to  wreck 
his  own  health  or  happiness.  (This  advice 
will  strike  most  people  as  wholly  unnecessary! 

We  believe  that  every  individual  has  the 
right  to  all  the  happiness  he  can  find,  pro- 


CALLOUSED    SYMPATHIES. 

viclecl,  in  obtaining  the  same,  he  appropriates 
what  properly  belongs  to  nobody  else.  It  is 
his  duty  to  make  the  most  of  this  life,  and 
get  all  the  good  out  of  it  that  is  rationally 
possible.  He  can  not  do  this  if  he  allows 
his  spiritual  or  intellectual  unfoldment  to  be 
retarded  from  any  cause. 

Nature  wisely  conceals  from  us,  except  in 
a  meagre  way,  the  sufferings  she  inflicts  upon 
others.  She  knows  that  most  of  us  have  all 
the  troubles  and  heart-aches  of  our  own  that 
we  ought  to  endure,  or  can  well  bear  up 
under.  And  yet  there  is  no  soul  so  com- 
pletely bankrupt,  both  in  worldly  wealth  and 
in  the  finer  humanities,  as  to  have  nothing  to 
spare  for  others — nothing  of  needed  temporal 
assistance,  or  of  sympathy  or  brotherly  love. 
If  such  there  be  they  are  to  be  pitied.  For 
them  there  is  no  blessing  in  the  beautiful 
sunshine,  nor  in  the  melody  of  the  birds  or 
rippling  brooks.  The  glory  of  the  earth  and 
the  grandeur  of  the  heavens  have  no  voice 
for  their  ears.  They  are  souls  out  of  tune, 
and  can  only  give  forth  jangling  and  discor- 
dant sounds. 

It  should  be  the  aim  and  ambition  of  all  to 


148  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

get  themselves  in  tune — in  harmony  with  the 
universe, — to  find  out  as  nearly  as  possible, 
what  Nature  means  with  them,  and  then  lend 
a  helping  hand  to  the  turning  out  of  a  good 
job.  Nature  furnishes  the  raw  material  of 
manhood,  and  she  expects  us  to  work  it  into 
shape.  The  material  may  not  all  be  of  first- 
class  quality  ;  in  fact  some  of  it  may  be  badly 
damaged  by  ancestral  taint  ;  yet  the  true 
theory  is  to  make  the  best  use  of  such  material 
as  we  may  chance  to  have.  It  is  no  doubt 
more  creditable  to  some  people  that  they  are 
only  average  sinners,  than  for  others  that 
they  are  shining  saints.  In  the  former  case 
it  is  a  wonder  they  are  no  worse,  considering 
the  circumstances  of  their  birth  and  early 
training.  In  the  latter,  it  is  a  wonder,  for 
the  same  reason,  how  they  could  have  been 
anything  else. 

All  that  the  good  Father  requires  of  any 
man  is  to  do  the  best  he  can. 


As  between  a  good  heart  and  a  sound 
head,  we  would  prefer  the  former — in  a  next- 
door  neighbor ! 


RELIQIDN  DF  HUMANITY, 


is  impossible  that  all  men  should  see  all 
things  in  the  same  light,  owing  to  varia- 
tions in  capacity  for  observation,  in  develop- 
ment of  brain,  in  natural  bent  and  educational 
drift  of  thought,  and  from  various  other 
causes  which  are  patent  to  every  student  of 
human  nature.  It  is  doubtless  well  for  us 
that  there  is  this  diversity  among  men,  else 
this  would  be  a  very  tame  world.  If  all  were 
true  Christians  there  would  be  no  work  of 
reformation  for  Christians  to  perform.  If 
there  were  no  temptations  to  sin  there  would 
be  no  particular  virtue  in  goodness,  on  the 
same  principle  that  if  there  was  no  alcohol 
in  the  world  there  would  be  no  name  for 
temperance — no  virtue  in  abstinence. 

It  is  impossible  for  the  mind  to  reason 
itself  into  the  belief  that  white  is  black,  or 
that  the  sun  rises  in  the  west.  There  are 
propositions  outside  the  realm  of  natural 
facts,  propositions  widely  divergent  in  their 
character,  which  some  minds  can  never  ac- 


150  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

cept  as  positive  truths.  Thus  it  seems  that 
we  are  here  in  accordance  with  a  great  plan 
of  the  Universe  —here  to  struggle  with  con- 
ditions and  circumstances  that  seem  essential 
to  our  growth  and  development  as  rational 
beings,  and  without  which  we  should  be 
mere  passive  instruments  in  the  hands  of 
Nature,  as  characterless  and  helpless  as  the 
log  that  floats  upon  the  current  of  the  river, 
outward  and  onward  to  some  unknown  sea. 

We  look  around  us  and  we  see  doubters 
on  every  side — honest  and  thoughtful  doubt- 
ers— doubters  thronging  the  avenues  of 
trade — scientific  doubters — >x>od  men  and 
noble  women,  who  aim  to  walk  uprightly  in 
the  world  ;  who  pay  their  honest  debts  ; 
who  wrong  no  man,  and  whose  hearts  are 
filled  with  good  will  towards  all  the  race. 
We  shall  not  argue  with  those  good  people 
who  believe  these,  their  doubting  fellow 
mortals,  are  all  on  the  broad  road  to  ruin. 
We  simply  know  that  they  exist  in  vast  num- 
bers, and  that  they  are  seemingly  beyond 
the  reach  of  conviction  of  the  errors  of  their 
opinions,  if  errors  they  are.  And  yet  are 
they  wholly  without  religious  feeling? 


RELIGION  OF  HUMANITY.  151 

Surely  not,  if  the  exercise  of  chanty, 
brotherly  love,  and  all  those  virtues  which 
adorn  human  character  count  for  aught. 

Again,  we  look  around  us  and  we  behold 
misery,  crime  and  ignorance  everywhere — 
fellow-beings  groveling  in  grossness,  and 
dead  to  every  impulse  of  a  noble  manhood. 
We  see  on  every  hand  the  result  of  violated 
law — children  robbed  of  their  natural  birth- 
right to  healthful  bodies — die  world  peopled 
with  moral  deformities — the  strong  oppress- 
ing the  weak — night  prevailing  over  right. 
Here  is  a  field  for  believers  and  unbelievers 
alike — a  common  ground  of  religious  use- 
fulness that  should  know  neither  sect  nor 
sex.  It  is  the  broad  field  of  humanity, 
where  all  true  men  and  women  can  meet  and 
work  to  a  common  purpose.  And  how  vast 
the  work,  how  great  the  need  of  clear  con- 
ceptions of  human  duty,  and  of  an  enlightened 
understanding  that  makes  its  pathway  plain. 

When  mankind  stops  wasting  its  substance 
of  brain  power  and  physical  effort  upon 
abstractions,  and  lays  its  hand  firmly  to  the 
plow-share  of  practical  reform,  we  shall  have 
less  use  lor  prisons,  for  asylums  for  the 


1  =  2  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

indigent  and  insane  —  less  poverty  and  in- 
harmony  in  the  world,  and  a  higher  average 
standard  of  human  happiness.  And  when  it 
learns  more  fully  that  true  happiness  comes 
only  with  right  living  and  right  doing,  we 
shall  cease  to  cavil  at  the  opinions  or  beliefs 
of  others.  It  is  what  a  man  does  for  human- 
ity —  not  what  dogmas  he  believes  in  —  that 
will  then  express  the  mint  value  of  the  man. 
Would  that  we  all  had  more  charity  for  what 
may  seem  to  us  errors  of  opinions  in  others. 


(o^.  -- 


HE  would  be  considered  insane  who  should, 
without  chart  or  compass,  sail  out  upon  the 
ocean,  and,  with  no  port  in  view,  drift  hither 
and  thither  upon  the  vast  deep  ;  and  yet 
multitudes  of  souls  float  out  upon  the  mysti- 
cal sea  of  life  as  aimless  and  objectless  —  no 
star  or  beacon  light  to  guide  them  o'er  the 
dreary  waste. 

IT  is  better  to  live  rich  —  that  is,  rich  in  the 
sumptuous  enjoyment  of  all  soulful  things  —  . 
and  die  poor  in  purse,  than  to  live  an  empty 
soul-life,  and  leave  millions  for  heirs  to 
quarrel  over. 


SINGLE  BLESSEDNESS 


Resolved, — That    an   unmarried   man  is  happier,  and  can  do 
more  good,  than  a  married  man. 

E  above  resolution  constituted  the 
theme  of  discussion  by  a  literary  society 
of  Oakland,  recently.  As  regards  the  "  happi- 
ness "  part  of  the  proposition  ;  there  is  a  wide 
diversity  of  opinion  as  to  what  constitutes  hap- 
piness. If  sleeping  alone  in  a  hog  pen,  with  no 
one  to  scratch  your  back,  and  with  freedom  to 
chew  tobacco  in  bed  and  expectorate  where 
you  please  ; — if  feeding  on  boarding-house 
hash,)  a  compound  of  stale  beef,  cockroaches 
and  red  hair)  and  having  a  joint  ownership 
with  the  chambermaid  in  the  use  of  your 
tooth-brush  ; — if  living  selfishly  for  your  own 
enjoyment,  with  the  feeling  gradually  creep- 
ing over  you  that  you  are  of  no  earthly  use 
in  the  world  ;  if,  when  you  die,  to  be  un- 
feelingly chucked  into  a  hole  in  the  ground^ 
without  one  tear  of  fond  remembrance  to 
moisten  the  earth  that  rattles  down  upon  your 
coffin  ; — -if  this  condition  of  things  constitutes 


154  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

happiness,  then  most  assuredly  is  a  single  life 
especially  conducive  of  happiness.  Still,  one 
had  better  endure  all  this,  and  infinitely  more 
of  the  same  sort,  than  to  be  yoked  for  life  to 
a  good-for-nothing  woman  —  too  many  of 
whom  modern  society  fashions  and  turns  out 
upon  the  world.  But  a  good,  true,  noble 
loving  woman,  there  is  nothing  like  her. 


HE  who  would  attain  the  truest  happiness 
must  forget  self,  and  seek  to  lift  the  burdens 
from  weary  laden  souls,  —  scattering  the 
flowers  of  kindness  and  sympathy,  and  mak- 
ing light  the  hearts  of  those  around.  Then 
•comes  the  joy  and  consciousness  of  having 
-done  some  good  to  others,  which  brings  the 
:sweetest  balm  to  our  own  hearts.  And  he 
-who  does  most  good  to  his  fellow-man  knows 
a  bliss  that  the  narrow,  selfish  man  can  never 
feel. 

THE  rapid  march  of  invention,  during  the 
last  quarter  of  a  century,  has  so  revolutionized 
our  systems  of  labor  as  to  make  the  readjust- 
ment of  man  to  the  soil  and  to  the  sources  of 
subsistence  a  necessity. 


PHILOSOPHY  DF  LIFE, 


lj|T  is  safe  to  assume  that  all  humanity 
liil  desire  happiness,  and  any  failure  to  attain 
the  fruition  of  this  desire,  must  be  from  lack 
either  of  proper  conditions  for  right  enjoy- 
ment, or  of  proper  effort  to  that  end.  The 
want  of  proper  conditions — such  as  inherited 
tendencies  to  disease,  strong  natural  bias  to 
evil,  and  unfavorable  surroundings  in  early 
life — are  all  beyond  the  control  of  the  individ- 
ual ;  hence  the  manhood  or  womanhood 
of  every  person  must  necessarily  take  its 
complexion  largely  from  circumstances  be- 
yond and  outside  of  their  own  volition.  This 
should  teach  us  charity  towards  others  worse 
conditioned  than  ourselves  ;  while  at  the 
same  time  it  should  stimulate  us  to  put  forth 
every  effort  in  our  power  to  master  the  re- 
sults of  bad  conditions  in  our  own  natures. 
It  should  also  teach  us  the  importance  of 
so  living  that  we  may  not  transmit  to  others 
the  evils  that  have  been  handed  down  to  us. 
'"  Cease  to  do  evil  and  learn  to  do  well." 


156  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

This  is  the  lesson  from  which  is  evolved  all 
reform  in  individual  or  public  life.  When  a 
man  learns  that  the  right  thing  is  the  best 
thing — whether  the  lesson  comes  to  him  by  a 
gradual  unfoldment  of  the  understanding, 
through  the  exercise  of  enlightened  reason, 
or  by  some  sudden  evolution  of  feeling  ra- 
diating his  nature  to  a  nobler  purpose — he  is 
on  the  right  track. 

What  we  want  in  practical,  every-day  life, 
is  an  article  of  humanity  that  will  "  wash  '•'• 
a  fabric  of  character  that  will  "  wear,"  and  if 
possible   improve   with  age.     We  want  less 
crowding — less  selfishness  among  men.     We 
want    more   of  that   outflowing  brotherhood 
that  can  sympathize  with  another's  woe,  and 
that  is  ready  to  reach  out  a  friendly  hand  to 
help    pull    another's    load.      We    want    well 
balanced  heads  and  warm,  humane  hearts— 
not  frisking  in   senseless   antics  on   Pisgah's 
hights    to-day,  and    to-morrow    groping   and 
wailing   by  the    "cold  streams  of  Babylon," 
but  with  unfaltering  steadiness  and  firmness 

o 

—with  an  uprightness  and  integrity  of 
character  that  knows  no  deviation — moving 
right  onward  to  a  purpose — the  highest  pur- 


PHILOSOPHY    OF    LIFE.  157 

pose — a    grand     and     noble     manhood    and 
womanhood. 

Here  is  a  common  plane  of  thought  and 
action  upon  which  all  true  men  can  meet  and 
labor.  It  is  our  everlasting  quibbling  about 
methods  that  destroys  one-half  the  good 
that  people  would  do  in  the  world.  We  are 
not  content  to  let  others  think  as  they  will, 
even  though  the  outcome  of  their  thought, 
coupled  with  their  aim  in  life,  means  all  one 
thing,  at  least  so  far  as  the  general  welfare 
and  happiness  of  mankind  in  this  life  is  con- 
cerned. We  live  in  the  eternal,  ever  present 
Now.  If  we  make  the  best  use  of  our  lives 
in  the  present  tense,  it  is  the  best  that  we 
can  do. 


MANY  people  waste  the  best  portion  of 
their  lives  in  worrying  about  what  others 
may  think  and  say  of  them  ;  when  if  they 
would  "let  the  world  wag,"  and  endeavor  to 
live  out,  in  their  own  lives,  their  best  ideals 
of  manhood,  or  womanhood,  they  would  find 
themselves  enjoying  a  far  greater  measure  of 
happiness. 


158  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 


NIGHT, 


JHE  sun  upon  his  purple  pillow  rests 
Behind  the  western  hills.     An  azure  cloud, 
Fringed  with  the  glory  of  departing  day, 
As  gorgeous  as  e'er  Israel's  legions  led, 
Stands  sentinel  above  his  royal  couch. 
One  by  one  the  golden  buds  of  night 
Unfold  their  stary  petals  to  my  gaze, — 
The  constellated  armies  of  the  skies,  • 
A  voiceless  host,  are  ever  marching  on, 
With  silent  tread  and  majesty  supreme, 
In  the  high  path  of  heaven's  unbounded  space. 

The  winds  are  lulled  to  sleep  ; 
No  sound  of  rustling  leaf,  nor  insect  hum, 
Nor  din  of  busy  life,  breaks  on  my  ear  ; 
And  yet  a  melody  pervades  all  space, 
As  of  unnumbered  harps  by  angels  played,— 7 
Angelic  choirs,  whose  silken  fingers  sweep 
The  silv'ry  chords,  until  the  vast  expanse 
Seems  filled  with  the  soft  symphony  of  Heaven. 
Alone  I  stand  upon  the  silent  heath, — 
A  worthless  speck  upon  the  object  glass 
Of  God's  great  microscope.     Unnumbered  worlds, 
Whose  vastness  staggers  thought, around  me  blaze, 
Filling  immensity  with  beams  of  light. 


NIGHT.  159 

For  what  was  all  this  wondrous  glory  made  ? 

I  send  the  dove  of  thought  from  this  frail  ark, 

That  coasts  along  the  shores  of  time,  away 

To  yon  bright  spheres  ;  I  charge  it  penetrate 

The  mystery  profound,  and  bring  me  back 

Some    branch   of  knowledge  from  those  upper  worlds. 

A  bootless  errand.     Wearied  with  its  flight, 

Back  to  my  longing  soul  it  comes  again, 

Bringing  no  token — leaving  all  in  gloom. 

Mark  yon  lurid  gleam  ; 
As  though  a  star  from  its  fixed  center  shot, 
Trailing  a  fiery  shaft  athwart  the  sky, 
Then  fading  softly  into  silent  naught, 
Leaving   the  dark  more  dense.     A  moment  here 
It  flashed  across  my  wond'ring  soul  ;  the  next, 
Went  out  in  night  forever. 

But  lo  !  what  splendor  breaks  upon  my  sight, 
Paling  the  stars  along  the  northern  sky  ! 
Now  jetting  up  in  streams  of  rosy  light, 
Until  the  firmament  of  heaven  glows 
And  flashes  with  supernatural  fire  ! 
Now  from  the  zenith  drooping  gently  down, 
Until  the  earth  with  glory  is  festooned, 
And  curtained  in  with  soft  auroral  light. 

Such  are  the  glorious  visions  of  the  night, 
Lifting  the  soul  to  higher  realms  of  thought, 
In  contemplating  the  infinity  of  God. 


'6O  OUR  SUNDAY    TALKS. 

"WHAT  IS  RELIGION? 


'HAT  is  religion  ?  Perhaps  no  better 
answer  can  be  given  to  the  question 
than  this  :  that  it  is  the  practice  of  goodness. 
Whether  this  answer  embodies  the  all  of 
religion,  or  not,  as  doubtless  many  will  say 
not,  certain  it  is  that  a  religion  without  the 
practice  of  goodness  is  no  better,  if  not 
worse  (and  generally  worse),  than  no  re- 
ligion at  all.  It  is  the  shell  without  the 
kernel — the  casket  without  the  jewel — the 
shadow  without  the  substance.  To  the 
practice  of  this  kind  of  religion — a  religion 
with  the  element  of  goodness  left  out —  nay 
be  attributed  all  the  cruelties  and  crimes  of 
martyrdom,  and  all  the  fierce  persecution 
for  opinion's  sake,  that  have  disgraced  and 
blackened  the  ages,  and  left  their  ineffaceable 
stain  upon  the  church,  Although  in  the 
sunburst  of  enlightened  thought  of  these 
"  latter  days,"  the  terrible  physical  evils  that 
followed  the  practice  of  a  goodless,  or  God- 
less, religion  in  former  times,  are  impossible 
forever  more  ;  nevertheless  the  world,  or 


WHAT  IS  RELIGI  )N  ?  l6l 

rather    the     church,    is    largely    overstocked 
with  a  modified  form  of  the  same  article. 

Goodness,  to  be  thoroughly  genuine, — 
that  is  to  possess  staying  qualities, — must  be 
<lbred  in  the  bone."  A  fair  article  may  be 
acquired,  perhaps,  by  what  is  called  con- 
version— a  sudden  or  spasmodic  revolution 
of  the  moral  nature,  like  a  change  of  the 
polarity  of  the  earth,  or  something  of  that 
sort, — but  it  is  too  apt  to  be  only  superficial 
in  its  character — hardly  skin  deep.  It  seldom 
gets  down  through  the  froth  of  the  emotions 
and  strikes  its  grappling  irons  into  the  firm 
and  solid  substance  of  the  soul.  It  is  an 
i  npulsive  sort  of  goodness,  that  operates 
only  in  the  heat  of  a  revival,  and  then  con- 
geals into  a  chronic  condition  of  irreligious 
selfishness,  if  not  of  positive  badness. 

The  Great  Spirit  of  Life,  Law  and  Love 
works  upon  the  moral  forces  of  the  world 
only  through  human  agencies.  Each  individ- 
ual soul  is  a  self-constituted  and  divinely 
appointed  and  commissioned  Committee  of 
the  Whole  to  carry  out  that  work.  The 
man  who  prays  God  to  bless  the  widow  and 
the  fatherless,  to  clothe  the  naked  and  feed 


I  62  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

the  hungry  ;  or  to  do  any  other  act  or  thing* 
that  he  has  it  in  his  power  to  perform  him- 
self, is  simply  wasting  his  breath  and  trifling 
with  his  own  moral  nature.  God  doesn't 
work  in  that  way.  And  yet  how  much  of 
this  sort  of  praying  is  done.  It  is  the 
practice  of  religion  with  the  soul  of  religion 
left  out. 

If  the  money  and  time  we  spend  in  that 
kind  of  religious  worship  that  endeavors,  by 
penitence  and  tears,  to  placate  a  wrathful 
and  revengeful  God  ;  or,  by  high-sounding 
praise  and  hallelujahs,  to  tickle  the  ears  of  ^ 
vain  one,  were  devoted  to  the  simple  practice 
of  goodness,  isn't  it  barely  possible  that  this 
would  be  a  better  and  happier  world,  and 
that  the  Being  we  seek  to  honor  would  think 
all  the  better  of  us  for  it  ?  At  any  rate, 
would  we  not  learn  thereby  to  think  better 
of  ourselves  ? 

The  religion  that  troubles  itself  about  the 
heathen  in  pagan  lands,  or  worries  itself  sick 
over  the  sins  of  an  unregenerate  world, 
while  at  the  same  time  its  neighbor  across 
the  way  is  struggling  with  the  "wolf  at  the 
door,"  or  perishing  for  a  sympathetic  word, 


WHAT  IS    RELIGION?  163 

isn't  worth  harvesting.      It  wouldn't  yield  a 
bushel  to  the  acre  ;    and  mostly  cheat  at  that, 

If  this  world  is  ever  to  be  made  better,— 
and  that  it  will  be  is  a  moral  certainty,  for 
eternal  progress  is  a  law  of  nature, — it  must 
be  accomplished  through  human  agency. 
No  matter  what  power  may  be  behind  man, 
and  working  through  him,  he  must  perform 
the  work  himself.  No  one  will  do  it  for  him. 
He  must  answer  his  own  prayers.  And  a 
first  rate  place  to  begin  this  work  is  right  in 
his  own  soul. 

Most  people  are  reasonably  good  when 
they  find  out  what  ails  them.  All  they  want 
is  to  have  their  faces  set  in  the  right  direction, 
when  they  will  walk  right.  With  our  noble 
co-laborers  in  the  church  and  the  world,  be 
it  ours  to  assist  in  setting  them  right. 


HE  who  thinks  for  himself,  and  sometimes 
thinks  wrongly,  possesses  an  individuality 
and  self-reliance  that  constitute  sterling 
elements  of  character  that  many  a  saint, 
schooled  in  other  modes  of  thought,  has  been 
lacking  in. 


164  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

TRUTH  SPOKEN  IN  JEST, 


'HAT'S  yours  is  mine,  and  what's  mine 
is  my  own."  There  is  many  a  truth 
spoken  in  jest,  and  perhaps  there  is  none 
more  truthful,  or  more  often  spoken  by  mar- 
ried men  than  that  we  have  chosen  above  for 
a  few  words  for  comment. 

A  man  and  woman  enter  into  joint  part- 
nership for  life.  Say,  each  brings  to  the 
partnership  some  little  means — just  sufficient 
to  obtain  a  humble  start  in  the  world.  Per- 
haps they  buy  land,  and  by  hard  work,  in 
time,  obtain  a  competency.  All  of  this  time 
the  husband  handles  all  the  company  funds, 
and  generally  doles  out  to  the  wife,  grudg- 
ingly and  complainingly,  such  pittances  as 
she  may  absolutely  need  for  her  personal 
use.  As  a  rule,  she  works  more  hours,  and 
performs  more  hard  manual  labor,  in  propor- 
tion to  her  strength,  than  does  her  husband. 
This  is  evident  from  the  fact  that  he  grows 
strong  and  robust,  while  she  shows  the  signs 
of  toil  and  care,  and  is  often  broken  down  in 


TRUTH  SPOKEN  IN  JEST.  165 

health  from  overwork  and  child-bearing  be- 
tore  she  reaches  middle  age.  Not  a  dollar 
of  all  their  joint  earnings  can  she  call  her 
own.  If  she  wants  a  little  money  never  so 
much,  she  must  explain  to  him  all  the  whys 
and  wherefores,  and  render  a  strict  account 
for  every  cent  expended. 

What  is  the  result  of  all  this  unfairness  ? 
We  could  cite  numerous  instances  where 
wives  and  daughters  have  had  to  resort  to  a 
system  of  petty  larceny  to  obtain  what  was 
justly  their  due — actually  picking  the  pockets 
of  the  husband  and  father  at  convenient 
opportunities,  and  following  up  the  practice 
for  years.  Who  can  blame  them  ?  and  yet 
what  sort  of  effect  must  such  practices 
naturally  have  upon  the  children  of  such 
parents  ?  Cases  are  not  rare  where  the 
mother,  driven  through  the  parsimony  of 
the  husband  to  steal  in  this  manner,  has 
branded  the  bias  and  purpose  of  theft  upon 
the  soul  of  her  unborn  offspring. 

But  some  one  may  ask,  Isn't  the  husband 
the  natural  head  of  the  family,  and  hence  the 
proper  judge  of  their  needs  ?  We  answer, 
that  the  wife  is  entitled  by  right  to  her 


I  66  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

proper  share  of  the  company  earnings,  and 
to  be  treated  as  an  equal  in  the  family.  If 
she  chooses  to  leave  her  share  in  his  hands 
for  investment,  as  most  wives  would,  that  is 
her  privilege.  What  we  insist  upon  is  that 
she  shall  have  such  portion  of  the  joint  earn 
ings  as  she  may  need,  without  question. 
Industrious  wives  are  generally  safe  bankers. 
They  will  economize  and  save  in  a  hundred 
ways  that  a  man  would  never  think  of. 
They  never  spend  their  money  in  saloons, 
nor  for  cigars,  nor  do  they  bet  on  horse 
races.  They  can  certainly  be  trusted  with 
their  own. 

We  will  venture  to  suggest  what  we  regard 
as  the  true  policy  in  family  finances  :  First, 
the  wife  should  have  a  weekly  or  monthly 
allowance,  proportioned  to  the  value  of  her 
services  as  housekeeper  and  the  amount  of 
the  husband's  income.  The  children,  also, 
as  soon  as  they  arrive  at  a  suitable  age, 
should  have  their  separate  allowances,  from 
which  they  should  be  expected  to  clothe 
themselves  and  defray  all  of  their  personal 
expenses.  This  would  teach  them  business 
principles.  They  would  soon  learn  to  econ- 


TRUTH   SPOKEN  IN  JEST,  167 

omize — to  live  within  their  means,  and  get 
something  ahead.  The  fact  of  possession 
carries  with  it  a  sense  of  responsibility  and 
dignity.  By  this  arrangement  the  home 
would  be  exalted,  and  the  family  relation 
made  more  harmonious  and  attractive.  It  is 
humiliating  to  a  sensitive  woman  to  be 
always  obliged  to  crave  as  a  favor  what  she 
feels  in  her  soul  is  hers  of  right. 

Consider    these    things,    O,    ye     skinflint 
husbands ! 


THE  man  who  imagines  the  world  owes 
him  a  living  mistakes  his  own  importance  in 
the  economy  of  the  universe.  The  world 
owes  him  nothing.  On  the  other  hand,  he  is 
indebted  to  the  world  for  the  gases  and 
minerals  of  his  worthless  body,  which  he 
ought  to  settle  for,  and  the  sooner  the  better. 

THERE  is  no  credit  in  sobriety  to  one  who 
dislikes  the  taste  of  liquor,  nor  in  purity  of 
life  to  one  who  has  never  been  tempted. 

THE  profoundest  vacuum  in  the  world  is 
the  vacuum  of  an  empty  soul. 


I  68  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

WDRK, 


|HE  Scriptural  injunctions  to  "take  no 
thought  of  the  morrow,"  and  to  "  sell  all 
that  thou  hast  and  give  to  the  poor,"  were 
probably  never  intended  to  be  lived  up  to 
strictly  ;  but  rather  that  one  should  not  set 
his  whole  heart  on  worldly  gain,  and  should 
give  as  liberally  as  his  means  will  admit  to  re- 
lieve the  suffering  and  misery  which  every- 
where abound  in  the  land,  Work  is  an  absolute 
necessity  for  a  healthy  condition  of  body  and 
mind;  and  whoever  works  with  a  purpose 
must  take  "  thought  of  the  morrow,"  and 
extend  his  plans  into  the  future.  Idleness  is 
the  'mother  of  vice.  Constant  physical  labor 
is  the  only  reliable  protector  of  virtue. 
There  is  nothing  that  subdues  the  passions 
and  keeps  the  blood  tame  like  hard  work. 
It  is  a  hundred  fold  more  effective  than 
prayer,  as  the  experience  of  the  Church  and 
the  world  abundantly  proves.  Not  that  we 
would  underrate  prayer,  which  in  its  true 
meaning  is  an  aspiration — a  desire — for 


WORK.  169 

something  better.  Life  should  be  a  constant 
prayer.  But  prayer  is  not  of  the  least  ac- 
count without  works.  The  Lord  helps  those 
only  who  help  themselves.  All  nature  is 
governed  by  fixed  and  unalterable  laws. 
Whoever  lives  in  harmony  with  these  laws 
will  be  happy.  Blessings  flow  in  fixed  chan- 
nels. To  enjoy  the  blessings  we  must  go 
where  they  are — they  will  never  come  to  us. 
Work,  if  you  would  reap  the  richest  rewards 
of  life.  Work,  if  you  would  live  in  the  sun- 
shine, and  enjoy  the  fruits  of  contentment. 
Work  on  and  work  ever,  hoping,  trusting, 
and  growing  into  the  full  development  of  an 
upright,  noble  and  glorious  manhood. 


THE  thief  who  steals  my  cloak  has  no 
right  to  my  coat,  and  it  is  not  sound  morality 
to  give  it  to  him. 

THE  world  is  wide  enough  for  people  to 
disagree  in  without  the  necessity  for  breaking 
each  other's  head. 

IN  starting  out  in  political  life  every  young 
man  should  be  quite  sure  he  is  right  before 
he  goes  ahead. 

OF  THE 

(  UNIVERSITY 


I  7O  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

K  SPRING-  MORNING-, 


|HE  joy  of  a  Spring  morning-  melts  over 
a  waking  world.  The  air  is  cool  and 
soft  with  exhaling  moisture,  and  balmy  with 
the  breath  of  many  flowers.  The  sunshine 
that  tides  over  the  eastern  hills  and  pours 
its  effulgent  waves  of  glory  down  upon  the 
plain  below,  breaks  into  golden  ripples 
among  the  verdure  of  forest  and  field.  From 
a  thousand  bird  throats,  from  the  lips  of  the 
opening  rose,  from  the  diamond  eyes  of  the 
dew-drop,  from  the  great  heart  of  Nature 
throbbing  with  life  and  love,  bursts  forth  an 
anthem  of  gladness  to  the  new  born  day. 
How  calm  and  beautiful  is  our  Mother 
.Earth — so  old,  and  yet  so  fresh  and  fair. 

Upon  such  a  morning  as  this,  with  the 
soul  in  tune  with  Nature's  diviner  harmonies, 
one  can  hardly  realize  that  discord  and  in- 
harmony  exist  in  the  world — that  hate  finds  a 
lodgment  in  human  breasts — that  man  could 
ever  be  at  war  with  man.  All  Nature  is  full 
of  beckoning  hands  and  welcoming  voices, 


A    SPRING    MORNING.  I /I 

inviting  man  to  a  truer  and  higher  life.  She 
says  to  him  from  the  heart  of  the  rose,  Be 
beautiful  in  soul  as  I  am,  and  fragrant  with 
the  aroma  of  good  deeds.  She  calls  to  him 
from  mountain  hights  of  eternal  snows,  say- 
ing, Be  white  arid  pure  as  I  am,  and  warm  in 
heart  as  the  fires  that  glow  down  deep  in  my 
own  bosom.  She  speaks  to  him  from  the 
towering  oak,  hoary  with  the  breath  of  cen- 
turies, Be  strong  and  firm  as  I  am,  and 

<t> 

deeply  rooted  in  manly  principles,  that  shall 
withstand  the  shocks  of  time  and  the  blasts 
of  adversity.  In  gentle  rain  and  warm 
sunshine,  that  bless  alike  the  growing  corn 
and  the  useless  weed,  she  says  to  him,  Give 
as  I  give  ;  be  broad  in  your  charities  ;  be 
liberal  and  grand.  She  calls  to  him  from 
rippling  stream,  from  deeply-flowing  river, 
from  broad  and  restless  ocean  ; — she  urges 
him  by  hints,  prophecies  and  warnings  ; — she 
appeals  to  him  through  the  laughter  of 
children,  the  blush  on  the  cheek  of  innocent 
girlhood,  the  cooing  of  the  turtle  dove  to  its 
mate  ;  she  pleads  with  him  in  the  heart- 
throes  of  anguish,  in  the  decrepitude  of  old 
age,  in  the  faint  whispers  of  the  dying  ; — she 


172  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

invites  him  by  every  impulse  of  her  own 
great  heart — by  every  noble  aspiration  of  his 
own  soul — to  come  up  higher — to  live  a 
nobler  and  truer  life. 

And  yet  how  few  there  are  who  heed 
Nature's  admonitions  or  profit  by  her  lessons. 
With  thoughts  and  eyes  bent  earthwards, 
they  never  see  the  stars  that  shine  forever 
in  the  "blue  vault  of  night"  above  thenx 
They  grovel  among  the  slums  of  earth-life, 
in  a  realm  of  unworthy  thoughts  and  desires, 
raking  up  garbage  instead  of  golden  grain. 
They  think  meanly  of  their  fellows,  and  act 
meanly  towards  them,  and  thereby  they 
grow  mean  and  narrow  in  their  own  natures. 
With  no  broad  outlook  upon  human  life  and 
duty,  but  wholly  wrapt  up  in  the  mantle  of 
their  own  selfishness,  they  live  on  husks  until 
old  age  creeps  upon  them,  and  they  find 
themselves  fattened  with  emptiness.  If  there 
is  a  pitiable  thing  in  all  this  universe  more 
pitiable  than  another,  it  is  a  human  being 
nearing  the  land  of  shadows,  with  a  heart 
barren  of  generous  impulses — a  life  crowned 
by  no  starry  garland  of  noble  deeds. 

Who  that  reasons — who  that  would  live  in 


A    SPRING    MORNING.  173 

the  upper  story  of  his  own  marvelous  being, 
and  get  the  best  out  of  life  and  its  ex- 
periences— can  look  out  upon  Nature  in  her 
peaceful  and  gentle  moods,  and  not  feel  her 
silent  influence  distilling  like  a  sweet  incense 
through  all  his  soul  ? 

Let  us  resolve   to  crather  wisdom  from  all 

o 

that  we  are  and  are  a  part  of — from  every 
surrounding  circumstance  and  condition  of 
life  and  death — laying  up  some  golden  stores 
of  character,  some  precious  treasures  of  soul, 
with  every  experience,  against  the  bleak 
Winter  whose  outlying  and  bordering 
Springtime  fills  the  measureless  Beyond. 


As  there  is  no  such  thing  as  equality 
among  men  in  their  capacity  to  master  the 
conditions  and  bear  the  burdens  of  life, 
therefore  government  should  recognize  this 
fact  and  favor  the  weak  horse  in  the  team 
with  the  longer  end  of  the  whifRetree.  In 
other  words,  the  burdens  of  government 
should  be  made  to  rest  upon  the  shoulders 
of  those  best  able  to  bear  them — which 
means  graduated  taxation. 


I  74  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

MATERIALISM 


ITH  the  spread  and  growth  of  material- 
ism  in  the  world,  coupled  with  the 
increasing  difficulties  in  the  way  of  meeting 
the  demands  of  life — demands  often  fictitious 
and  exacting, — we  find  a  growing  disregard 
for  life  itself.  And  this  is  not  at  all  surprising. 
Without  the  hope  of  something  beyond — a 
reasonable  assurance  that  this  stage  of  exist- 
ence does  not  bring  us  to  the  end  of  the 
journey-— the  man  overwhelmed  with  trouble, 
and  feeling  himself  no  longer  of  any  use  in 
the  world,  very  naturally  concludes  that  the 
best  disposition  he  can  make  of  himself  is  to 
quit,  and  close  out  his  contract  with  exist- 
ence. From  his  standpoint  of  thought  he 
reaches  conclusions  wholly  in  accordance 
with  the  natural  deductions  of  reason.  But 
does  he  not  reason  from  false  premises  ? 
Assuming  that  he  does  so  reason  there  seems 
to  be  a  necessity  for  something  to  anchor 
him  more  securely  to  life  and  duty  ;  and 
there  can  be  no  anchor  so  firm  as  the  as- 


MATERIALISM.  1 75 

surance  of  another  life.  Such  an  assurance 
seems  to  carry  with  it  an  awakened  sense  of 
obligation  to  this  life.  It  tells  us  that  we 
have  a  work  to  do  here,  and  that  if  we  shirk 
that  work  in  any  way  it  will  be  worse  for  us 
there.  And  then  it  is  the  dread  and  uncer- 
tainty of  the  nature  of  that  life — "  what 
dreams  may  come  when  we  have  shuffled  off 
this  mortal  coil,  must  give  us  pause,"  and 
induce  us  to  stay  by  this  life  as  long  as 
possible. 

We  have  no  sympathy  with  that  cold, 
calculating  philosophy  that  robs  man  of  all 
hope  of  a  future  life,  and  leaves  him  stranded 
on  the  bleak  shores  and  shoals  of  time.  It 
is  then  he  becomes  a  fit  subject  for  despair. 
Groping  in  the  dark  of  his  own  obscured 
hopes  he  loses  faith  in  himself.  He  turns 
his  eyes  earthward  among  the  shadows  and 
he  sees  no  light  in  the  gloaming — no  beckon- 
ing hand  in  the  distance.  If  he  would  only 
look  the  other  way  how  changed  would  all 
things  appear. 

How  often  do  we  have  occasion  to  say  to 
some  soul  bowed  down  with  a  great  sorrow, 
or  overtaken  by  some  great  affliction,  Be 


1/  OUR  SUNDAY    TALKS. 

brave  and  strong,  and  don't  give  up  the 
fight.  What !  surrender  life,  with  all  its 
possibilities  of  growth  and  grandeur.  How 
much  better  to  go  down  with  face  to  the  foe 
and  with  colors  nailed  to  the  mast. 

And  this  is  the  spirit  in  which  we  should 
grapple  with  existence.  If  trouble  comes — 
if  foes  to  body  or  soul  assail — place  your 
back  to  the  wall  and  face  them  bravely, 
determined  to  conquer  or  die  trying.  If 
they  come  of  your  own  folly  and  inviting, 
the  greater  the  need  for  prompt  and  de- 
cisive battle  that  shall  leave  you  not  only 
victor  but  wiser.  With  every  effort  to  con- 
quer there  comes  support  from  without  and 
from  within.  There  are  Bluchers  in  reserve 
in  every  heart-struggle,  ready  at  the  word  of 
command  to  hurl  their  legions  upon  the  foe 
in  your  defence.  Resolve  to  live,  and  live 
to  some  noble  purpose.  Never  surrender, 
though  the  powers  of  earth  and  air  combine 
against  you,  and  hell  yawns  at  your  feet. 

This  is  the  path  of  duty,  to  watch  and  to 
wait,  trusting  the  Good  Father  for  what  we 
can  not  clearly  understand.  Full  soon  will 
come  the  wintry  frosts  of  age — the  bowed 


"  I    DON  T    KNOW.  177 

form — the  hesitating  step — the  trembling 
hand.  Already,  with  many  of  us,  the  shad- 
ows are  falling  and  lengthening  toward  the 
east,  and  the  night  cometh  on  apace.  Let  it 
not  be  a  night  of  pitiless  gloom,  but  one 
fringed  with  the  glory  of  a  coming  day. 


"I  DDN'T  KNOW,' 


takes  a  large  amount  of  knowledge, 
grounded  in  a  solid  substratum  of  common 
sense,  to  enable  a  man  to  say,  "  I  don't 
know."  There  are  so  many  people  who 
claim  to  know,  but  who  actually  know  so 
little  or  nothing  of  what  they  pretend,  that 
it  is  indeed  refreshing  to  meet,  as  we  do 

o 

occasionally,  with  a  great,  big-hearted,  honest 
doubter — not  one  who  doubts  captiously  and 
dogmatically  ;  but  one  who  modestly  doesn't 
know,  and  knows  that  he  doesn't  know,  and 
isn't  ashamed  to  own  it. 

All   conscious   human  life  is  a  stupendous 

interrogation  point.      It  questions  everything 

—the   stars,   the  air,  the  earth,  the  sky.     It 


178  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

looks  down  upon  the  blade  of  grass,  the 
dew-drop  sparkling  in  the  sunbeam,  the  mole 
burrowing  blindly  under  the  ground,  the 
beetle  hiding  among  the  clods,  the  corn 
ripening  in  the  Autumn  haze.  It  peers  into 
the  wondering,  staring  eyes  of  the  new-born 
babe,  and  notes  the  far-off,  vacant  look  of 
the  dying.  It  sees  wrong  and  sin  reveling 
in  luxury,  and  honest  merit  out  at  the  knees 
and  elbows.  It  dissects  clown  through  the 
tissues  of  the  body,  and  searches  among  the 
secret  springs  and  recesses  of  heart  and 
brain.  It  traverses  the  realm  of  thought, 
emotion,  passion,  will.  And  it  is  eternally 
asking,  Wherefore  ?  Wherefore  •*  What 
does  all  this  mean  ?  It  coins  its  questions 
into  verse  : 

Eternal  Truth  !     Oh,  why  does  the  wail 
Of  the  innocent  burst  in  anguish  sad  ? 

Oh,  why  does  the  wrong  in  pomp  prevail, 
And  the  right  in  penury's  rags  go  clad  ? 

Tell  me,  ye  twinkling  orbs  of  night, 
That  jewel  the  skies  with  golden  gems, 

Do  beings  dwell  in  thy  realms  of  light  ? 
Are  their  brows  encircled  with  diadems  ? 


179 

Belentless  Death,  Oh  why  dost  thou  nip 
The  tender  flowers,  the  young  and  the  fair, 

And  dash  the  cup  from  the  spirit's  lip, 

That  the  tempter,  Hope,  hath  lifted  there  ? 

Thou  mystic  river,  when  time  is  o'er 
And  we  drift  on  thy  dreary  tide  away, 

Will  our  barks  e'er  reach  the  other  shore  ? 
Will 'our  spirits  wake  to  a  brighter  day? 

Will  the  phantoms  of  bliss  that  elude  us  here, 
And  hopes  that  charm  in  their  dazzling  sheen , 

Be  ours  to  possess  in  that  blissful  sphere, 
With  never  a  yawning  gulf  between  ? 

And  so  we  go  on,  ever  questioning-,  and 
hoping,  and  outreaching  towards  the  light, 
and  wondering  if  the  day  will  ever  come 
when  we  shall  see  and  know.  Thrice  happy 
he  through  whose  inner  consciousness  comes 
some  satisfying  answer,  bringing  with  it  an 
abiding,  restful  trust — a  voice  that  shall 
break  in  waves  of  gladness  over  his  doubting 
soul,  saying — 

Perhaps  ;  but  wait  till  this  mortal  night, 
With  its  shadows  of  doubt,  shall  fade  away  ; 

All  things  shall  seem  in  that  better  light 
As  never  thev  did  in  thv  house  of  clav. 


l8o  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

Then  shall  the  vanishing  hand  of  time 

Remove  from  thy  heart  all  doubts  and  fears, 

And  the  chastened  soul  to  bights  sublime, 
Shall  rise  from  the  mists  of  thy  mortal  years. 

And  in  this  faith  we  must  rest — if  not 
wholly  content,  at  least  we  should  school 
ourselves  to  be  reasonably  satisfied  there- 
with, until  we  can  obtain  the  better  knowl- 
edge— till  "  faith  shall  be  swallowed  up  in 
sight,"  and  death  shall  be  lost  in  victory. 

Therefore  we  give  joyful  welcome  and  all 
hail  to  any  system  of  religion  or  philosophy 
that  helps  to  lift  man  out  of  his  doubts,  and 
to  place  his  feet  upon  some  rock  of  assurance 
—whether  of  faith  or  assumed  knowledge- 
assurance  in  the  satisfying  belief  in  a  here- 
after ;  that  eternal  progress  is  a  law  of 
being,  and  that  the  time  will  surely  come 
when  the  labyrinthian  maze  of  doubt  and 
ignorance,  through  which  we  are  groping 
here,  shall  open  out  into  a  way  where  we 
shall  see  all  things  clearly  ;  where  all  clouds 
shall  disappear,  all  riddles  shall  be  solved, 
and  where  we  shall  KNOW. 


FDWER  DF  LDVE, 


all  the  forces  in  the  universe  of  spirit 
or  matter, — forces  that  play  upon  the 
emotions,  or  actuate  humanity  in  any  way — 
there  is  none  so  potential  in  its  influence  as 
the  all-conquering  power  of  love.  It  is  alike 
the  solace  of  tired  hearts,  and  the  motive 
that  moves  the  universe.  How  wonderful  is 
it  in  all  its  varied  phases  ; — parental  and 
conjugal  love,  that  holds  the  world  of  hu- 
manity in  its  orbit,  and  makes  existence 
possible, — social  and  fraternal  love,  that 
binds  society  into  indissoluble  bonds,  making 
existence  tolerable, — self-love,  that  inspires 
ambition,  binding  the  higher  loves  into  a 
chain  of  strength  and  beauty,  and  making 
them  more  effective  in  moulding  and  binding 
character  into  lasting  shapes  of  harmony  and 
grandeur. 

The  world  would  indeed  be  a  stupendous 
bear  garden — a  vast  den  of  snarling  mon- 
sters, who  would  in  the  end  devour  each 
other  and  become  extinct, — but  for  this 


I  82  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

magic  balm  from  the  pharmacy  of  heaven, 
distilling  ever  softly  and  gently  among  the 
sterner  and  baser  purposes  and  passions  of 
the  soul,  and  the  cruel  and  selfish  instincts  of 
undeveloped  and  unspiritualized  human  na- 
ture. It  is  as  though  the  doors  of  Heaven 
had  been  left  open,  and  from  thence  was 
wafted  the  fragrance  of  all  joy  and  gladness 
to  inspire  humanity  with  the  motives  to  a 
truer  and  diviner  life.  Show  us  the  soul 
wherein  love  is  not,  and  there  we  shall  find 
one  in  which  all  the  diviner  chords  of  being 
are  out  of  tune — a  heart  in  which  the  baser 
impulses  are  found  running  riot  and  making 
sad  havoc  and  inharmony  with  the  entire 
being.  There  we  shall  find  misanthropy 
souring  and  poisoning  the  sweet  springs  of 
life, — selfish  greed  trampling  out  gentle 
charity  and  even  humanity's  self, — unsated 
ambition  that  scruples  at  no  means  for  the 
attainment  of  its  ends, — anger,  revenge, 
hatred — demons  all — rankling  in  the  sacred 
places  of  the  soul,  and  making  it  a  dismal 
cavern  for  the  abode  of  unholy  things. 

Human  life,  however  grand  in  intellect,  or 
self-reliant  in  the  majesty  of  its  own  powers, 


POWER    OF    LOVE.  183 

must  have  something1  to  lean  upon,  especially 
in  its  hours  of  trial  that  come  to  all.  With- 
out some  gentle  outreaching  of  the  affections  ; 
without  the  clinging  and  twining  of  the 
heart's  tendrils  to  and  around  some  other  life 
or  lives,  with  its  inflowing  solace  of  com- 
pensating gladness,  as  the  reward  and  coun- 
terpois  of  such  tender  outreachings  and  yearn- 
ings, life  is  indeed  a  dreary  desert  waste — a 
sky  without  a  sun — a  night  without  one 
smiling  or  redeeming  star.  It  is  then  duty 
becomes  a  pathway  of  thorns  to  be  trodden 
with  aching  heart  and  bleeding  feet.  The 
bright  sunshine,  the  overarching  sky,  the 
melody  of  brooks  and  birds,  the  wooing  of 
fragrant  zephyrs,  the  myriad  lips  and  forms 
of  grand  and  glorious  Nature,  voice  no  sound 
of  gladness  to  that  gloomy  soul.  It  moves 
on  sadly  and  silently  amid  the  shadows, 
until  at  last  life  itself  grows  to  be  a  burden 
and  a  curse.  But  when  love  flashes  its 
divine  rays  along  the  way,  then  every  bur- 
den seems  light,  every  task  a  living  joy,  and 
duty  becomes  a  pathway  strewn  with  flowers. 
"  A  new  commandment  I  give  unto  you," 
said  the  Great  Teacher,  "that  ye  love  one 


184  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

another."      Here   is  the   sum   and  •  substance 
of  all  religion.      It  is  the  crown  and  glory  of 
manhood — the  guerdon  of  life  everlasting— 
the  shining  pathway  to  the  stars. 


HERDISM  IN  CDMMDN  LIFE, 


IE  who  leads  a  forlorn  hope  "  into  the 
jaws  of  death,"  with  the  eyes  of  the 
world  resting  upon  him,  is  much  less  a  hero 
than  he  who,  beset  by  the  snares  and  tempta- 
tions of  life,  triumphs  over  the  evil  prompt- 
ings of  his  own  nature.  There  is  an  unwrit- 
ten heroism  in  common  life  that  far  excels 
the  storied  heroism  of  the  great  and  power- 
ful. It  costs  one  something  to  be  brave  and 
true  when  no  eye  but  the  eye  of  one's  own 
soul  rests  upon  him — when  no  approving 
smile  cheers  him  on  save  that  of  his  own 
conscience.  And  yet  there  are  many  such 
heroes  in  all  the  silent  and  unheralded  ways 
of  life, 

We    have   seen  a  fair  young  girl,  frail  in 
health,  but  brave  an'd  strong  in  purpose,  turn 


HEROISM    IN    COMMON    LIFE.  185 

aside  from  the  seductive  allurements  to  a 
frivolous  and  empty  life — from  the  tempta- 
tions to  a  luxurious  and  wicked  one — and, 
storing  her  mind  with  the  treasures  of  knowl- 
edge, fit  herself  for  a  noble  work  and  duty. 
We  have  seen  her  take  up  her  own  and 
others'  burdens,  and,  oftimes  with  aching 
heart  and  bleeding  feet,  bear  them  uncom- 
plainingly along  life's  rugged  way.  We 
have  seen  a  young  man,  cast  out  upon  the 
world,  homeless  and  friendless,  but  buoyant 
in  spirit,  and  exuberant  with  healthy  life — 
with  mind  and  heart  keenly  sensitive  to  all 
the  fascinating  pleasures  that  lure  but  to 
destroy, — shutting  himself  out  from  the  com- 
panionship of  his  kind,  and  setting  his  face 
firmly  against  the  enticements  and  besetting 
snares  of  the  world.  We  have  seen  him 
"  burning  the  midnight  oil,"  and  with  eyes 
fixed  on  the  shining  hights,  laying  deep  and 
broad  the  foundations  of  a  character  upon 
which  to  rear  the  superstructure  of  a  man- 
hood that  should  withstand  the  "  shocks  of 
time,"  the  turmoil  and  vicissitudes  of  life, — 
till  old  age  should  mantle  it  with  its  snows. 
We  have  seen  men  and  women  in  humble 


I  86  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

life, — born  to  the  hard  conditions  of  poverty 
and  toil, — with  hearts  attuned  to  all  good- 
ness, and  souls  sweet  with  the  refining  bap- 
tism of  unselfish  charity.  We  have  seen 
them  bending  beneath  their  burdens  of  care, 
of  sickness,  of  poverty — with  faces  illumined 
with  the  smile  of  God, — grand  men  and 
noble  women,  whose  unwritten  lifj-histories 
might  be  summed  up  in  the  words — "  No 
trust  betrayed — no  duty  left  undone." 

Are  not  such  as  these  the  world's  truest 
^heroes  and  heroines  ?  And  are  not  their 
names  deserving  of  enrollment  on  Fame's 
whitest  and  most  enduring  scroll  ? 


IN  proportion  as  labor-saving  machinery 
supplements  muscle  in  the  work  of  the  world 
there  will  naturally  be  a  decreasing  demand 
(for  labor  unmixed  with  brains  ;  hence,  the 
laboring  man  should  learn  to  master  the 
machine  and  not  let  the  machine  master  him. 

THE  evil  that  some  unbalanced  natures  do 
is,  doubtless,  from  their  standpoint  of  reason- 
ing, the  right  thing  for  them  to  do. 


SOMETHING  AND  NDTHING- 


IHE  difference  between  having  some- 
thing and  having  nothing,  is  usually  the 
difference  between  saving  and  wasting. 
There  may  be  exceptional  cases,  arising  from 
physical  disability,  or  mental  incapacity,  but 
there  are  hardly  enough  of  them  to  vitiate 
the  rule. 

It  is  indeed  true  that  some  people  are 
born  to  wealth,  and  hence  need  not  trouble 
themselves  much  about  temporal  things.  It 
is  a  great  misfortune  to  one  to  be  thus  born  ; 
for  he  is  denied  the  soul  growth  and  strength 
that  comes  of  striving.  Rich  men's  sons  are 
proverbial  for  their  uselessness.  Although 
they  may  inherit  a  very  fair  stock  of  elemen- 
tal character,  it  is  apt  to  be  spoiled  in  the 
shaping.  Society  pampers  and  dawdles  them, 
until  they  grow  vain,  proud,  and  conceited 
with  an  importance  that  they  do  not  possess. 
And  then,  in  the  great  world  of  work  and 
use,  they  become  of  no  more  consequence 
than  a  Prince  Charles  poodle  in  the  economy 


I  88  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

of  a  stag  hunt.  A  man  needs  to  struggle 
with  the  hard  conditions  of  poverty  to  bring 
out  the  best  there  is  in  him.  The  world's 
masters  and  heroes  of  to-day — its  men  of 
brains  and  energy — sprung  from  humble 
beginnings. 

But  the  great  mass  of  mankind  are  born  to 
toil  ;  and  it  is  well  they  are,  or  in  the  onward 
sweep  of  time  humanity  would  soon  gravitate 
to  the  lower  forms  of  life  whence  it  sprung. 
It  is  to  this  toiling  class — the  bone  and  sinew 
of  society — the  honey-gatherers  of  life's 
busy  hive — we  wish  to  direct  our  "talk" 
to-day. 

Why  is  it  that  we  find  so  many  people  in 
the  world  without  homes,  or  other  earthly 
possessions — people  of  intelligence,  culture, 
and  of  industrious  habits.  Many  who  have 
reached  the  meridian  of  life — good  people — 
temperate  people — lay  by  nothing  from  year 
to  year  against  the  rainy  day  of  sickness,  or 
the  gray  Winter  of  old  age.  Whatever  their 
income  they  manage  that  it  shall  not  exceed 
their  outcome  ;  and  they  are  generally  to  be 
found  in  a  chronic  condition  of  "hard  up;" 
They  evidently  believe  in  having  a  good 


SOMETHING    AND    NOTHING.  189 

time  as  they  go  along.  In  a  certain  sense 
they  are  right  ;  and  yet,  how  much  more  of 
solid  comfort  could  they  not  obtain  out  of 
life  if  they  only  managed,  during  their  years 
of  earnings,  however  humble,  to  lay  by  some- 
thing for  a  sung  little  home  they  could  call 
their  own. 

There  is  no  poor  man,  of  ordinary  industry, 
but  that  has  his  times  of  prosperity.  He  ob- 
tains a  good  paying  job,  occasionally,  or 
enjoys  a  season  of  extra  remunerative  wages. 
But  instead  of  improving  the  occasion  as  a 
starter  for  a  home,  it  is  made  the  means  for 
a  larger  measure  of  present  gratification. 

A  hard-working  mechanic  will  frequently 
squander  for  beer  and  tobacco,  or  in  some 
other  foolish  gratification,  a  whole  day's 
earnings  ;  and  his  wife  will  make  herself 
wretched  if  she  can't  have  as  nice  a  bonnet 
as  is  worn  by  the  wife  of  old  Moneygrubs 
across  the  way.  It  isn't  so  much  what  a  man 
earns  or  spends  that  makes  or  breaks  him, 
as  it  is  what  he  saves.  It  is  his  determina- 
tion always  to  calculate  upon  a  little  margin 
for  the  family  sinking  fund,  which  shall  be 
sacred  from  spoliation. 


IQO  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

Poor  people,  with  nothing  to  depend  upon 
for  a  subsistence  but  the  labor  of  their  hands, 
are  foolishly  blind  to  their  own  truest  happi- 
ness when  they  seek  to  imitate  the  follies  of 
the  wealthy.  It  can  only  be  done  at  a  sac- 
rifice of  that  independence  of  character  and 
individuality  of  manhood  and  womanhood 
which  constitute  the  bulwark  and  casemate 
of  every  individual  soul. 

When  a  man  has  learned  to  live  within 
his  means,  and  lay  by  a  trifle  for  emergen- 
cies, even  though  he  has  to  wear  his  coat 
out  at  the  elbows  and  his  shoes  out  at  the 
toes,  and  can  snap  his  fingers  in  the  face  of 
society  and  say,  "  I  don't  care  for  your  non- 
sense," he  becomes  amoral  hero  of  whom  the 
world  should  be  proud.  And  the  woman 
who,  in  her  own  sweet  simplicity,  can  wear  a 
calico  dress,  and  be  happy  and  independent, 
while  her  next  door  neighbor  indulges  in  silks, 
has  mastere  d  one  of  the  most  difficult  prob- 
lems of  existence.  God  bless  such  people, 
say  we.  We  wish  there  were  more  of  that 
kind  in  the  world. 

Not  that  we   would  disparage  any  adorn- 
ment that  adds  to  the  beauty  and  symmetry 


SOMETHING    AND    NOTHING.  19 1 

of  "  the  house  we  live  in  "-—the  divine  temple 
of  the  human  soul.  But  it  should  be  done 
from  a  love  of  the  beautiful  in  one's  own 
soul,  rather  than  from  any  vain  desire  to 
shine  in  the  eyes  of  a  foolish  world.  And 
then  such  adornments  should  always  be  made 
secondary  to  comfort  ;  and  never  should 
they  be  indulged  in  beyond  what  one's 
means  will  reasonably  warrant,  nor  at  the 
expense  of  that  peace  of  mind,  without  which 
all  else  is  a  hollow  mockery. 


THE  amount  of  vitality  wasted  by  young- 
men  in  smoking  cigarettes,  would,  if  properly 
applied,  enable  them  to  lay  such  lasting 
foundations  of  character  as  would  give  them 
a  prominent  place  among  the  world's  heroes, 
statesmen,  orators,  poets,  painters,  law- 
givers, and  even  editors.  But  as  it  is  they 
smoke  away  their  brains  and  turn  out  noodles. 

WE  often  commit  a  great  mistake  in  with- 
holding our  good  opinions  of  those  we  love 
until  after  they  are  dead,  and  then  inscribing 
upon  their  tombstones  the  approving  words 
their  hearts  hungered  for  while  living. 


1 92  OUR  SUNDAY    TALKS, 

OLD  AG-E, 


JHERE  is  no  sight  more  beautiful  than 
that  of  a  man  or  woman  who  has 
passed  the  meridian  of  life,  with  locks 
whitening  in  the  frosts  of  years,  and  with 
face  turned  towards  the  setting  sun,  growing 
old  sweetly  and  gracefully.  There  ought  to 
be  no  such  thing  as  old  age,  except  in  a 
physical  sense.  Years  should  bring  v  isdom 
to  the  mind,  and  growth  and  grandeur  to 
the  soul,  but  not  age  to  the  heart.  That 
should  be  kept  ever  young  and  fair.  It 
should  become  more  and  more  beautiful  and 
fragrant  with  Spring  blossoms  as  the  years 
roll  away. 

But  there  is  so  much  to  make  us  old  in 
spirit — so  many  cares  and  heart-aches,  so 
much  work  and  worry,  so  many  losses  and 
disappointments — that  we  grow  old  and 
tired,  and  lose  our  youthful  freshness  and 
fragrance,  oftentimes,  ere  we  are  aware. 

In  the  morning  of  life  our  ships  sail  away 
to  unknown  seas,  well  ballasted  with  hope 


OLD    AGE.  193 

and  ambition.  We  reck  not  that  a  thousand 
dangers  await  them.  They  encounter  storm 
and  tempest,  fierce  cyclones,  treacherous 
currents,  sunken  rocks.  Unless  staunch  and 
true,  and  well  manned  with  a  resolute  crew, 
they  soon  become  drifting  wrecks,  or  go 
down  beneath  the  engulfing  waves.  How 
few  return  to  us  freighted  with  the  rich  in- 
voices of  character  which  constitute  the 
soul's  true  wealth.  We  sought  for  earthly 
treasures — treasures  of  worldly  gain,  social 
position,  gratified  ambition — and  our  ships 
return  to  us  empty  laden.  And  then  the 
shadows  of  disappointment  and  blighted 
hopes  gather  over  us  and  turn  the  fresh 
Springtime  of  our  lives  into  cheerless 
Autumn.  It  is  thus  we  grow  old,  wrinkled, 
and  gray,  in  spirit,  and  the  outlook  grows 
darker  as  we  near  the  end. 

The  end  ?  Rather  should  we  not  say  the 
beginning  ?  And  what  a  beginning !  But 
even  were  this  life  the  all  in  all  of  being,  and 
there  were  no  individualized  conscious  ex- 
istence beyond,  then  how  sad  and  unsatis- 
factory indeed  would  be  such  an  ending. 
Why,  if  we  lived  as  we  ought — if  we  made 


IQ4  °UR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

our  ventures  cautiously,  and  with  a  view  to 
those  imperishable  treasures  of  heart  and 
soul  that  survive  the  ravages  of  time,  instead 
of  seeking  so  entirely  after  the  fleeting  and 
fading  things  of  earth, — life  would  grow 
richer  and  sweeter  as  the  evening  advances 
and  its  shadows  lengthen.  Profiting  by  every 
experience — by  every  burden  and  heart-ache, 
every  mistake  and  failure, — we  would  gather 
strength  and  beauty  with  our  years,  and  then 
we  should  approach  the  goal  as  calmly  and 
softly— 

"  As  fades  the  Summer  cloud  away, 
As  sinks  the  gale  when  storms  are  o'er, 

As  gently  shuts  the  eye  of  day, 

And  dies  the  wave  along  the  shore." 

It  takes  but  really  little  to  make  a  man 
happy,  if  he  only  knows  it !  The  trouble 
with  most  people  is  they  don't  know  it. 
They  imagine  that  certain  factitious  circum- 
stances in  life — certain  wealthy  conditions 
and  surroundings  ;  the  ability  to  outshine 
and  outrival  in  the  hollow  mockery  of  life, 
fashionable  society  ;  that  these  are  the  car- 
goes our  ships  should  bring  back  in  order  to 
give  us  happiness.  There  never  was  a  graver 


OLD    AGE.  195 

mistake.  True  happiness  must  come  from 
within,  and  it  needs  but  little  from  without 
to  make  it  reasonably  complete. 

When  this  lesson  is  well  learned  and 
profited  by,  then  are  we  but  prepared  to 
live.  Then  shall  we  know  no  such  thing  as 
age,  save  in  that  gentle  decay  of  physical 
life  that  even  adds  a  charm  and  a  zest  to  the 
higher  enjoyments  of  the  soul.  And  thus  it 
is  that  when  this  life  is  most  complete  that 
we  are  best  prepared  to  lay  it  down  and 
take  our  chances  with  what  follows — con- 
fidently believing  that  if  it  is  truly  well  with 
us  here  it  will  be  all  right  with  us  there. 


THE    man    or    woman    who    has  no   well 
spring  of  joy  within — no  resources  of  philoso- 
phy   whence     to    derive    consolation     when 
trouble    comes — has  failed   to   profit   by   the 
hard  lessons  of  life. 

As  THE  child  can  not  learn  to  walk  without 
some  stumbling,  neither  can  there  be  any 
soul-growth  without  some  mistakes  ;  so  it  is 
better  to  grow  and  stumble  than  never  to 
grow  at  all. 


OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 


NATURE 


'ATURE,  in  her  varying  moods,  is  to 
day  a  merciless  tyrant,  and  anon  a 
gentle  and  loving-  mother.  We  look  upon 
the  track  where  the  fierce  cyclone  has  spent 
its  fury,  leaving  death  and  destruction  in  its 
path  ;  we  mark  the  wrecks  that  bestrew  the 
shore  when  the  wrath  of  the  waves  has 
subsided  ;  we  look  down  into  the  pleading 
eyes  of  the  dying  babe  ;  and  in  all  this 
apparent  inharmony  we  can  discover  naught 
but  cruelty — cruelty  without  a  motive,  with- 
out one  redeeming  trait.  If  there  is  an 
intelligent  purpose  in  Nature — a  guiding 
hand  in  the  universe,  that  holds  the  stars  in 
their  course,  and  commands  the  elements  to 
do  its  bidding, — as  we  are  taught  to  believe, 
arid  as  no  mortal  can  wisely  deny, — why,  we 
ask  in  vain  of  our  own  souls,  was  this  vio- 
lence and  cruelty  necessary  ?  Why  are  the 
elements  permitted  to  rend  and  lay  waste  ? 
Why  the  blighting  winds  to  sap  the  budding 
harvests,  that  famine  and  death  may  ravish 


NATURE.  197 

the  homes  of  the  poor  ?  Why  is  helpless 
infancy  and  inoffensive  manhood  made  to 
endure  the  torture  and  anguish  of  affliction, 
while  multitudes  less  worthy  are  permitted 
to  live  upon  the  mountain  top  of  health  and 
happiness  ? 

Again,  we  look  abroad  in  the  world,  and 
behold,  where  lately  swept  the  mad  cyclone 
the  wild  flower  now  turns  its  gentle  face  to 
the  sun,  and  the  bobolink  builds  its  nest  in 
the  fragrant  grass  ;  where  the  billows,  lashed 
into  madness  by  the  fierce  tempest,  hurled 
the  venturesome  sailor  to  swift  destruction, 
the  cooing  ripples  now  kiss  the  white  pebbles 
at  our  feet  ;  and  from  the  pillow  of  anguish, 
where  pain  and  suffering  long  held  high  car- 
nival among  the  nerves  of  helpless  innocence, 
there  now  distills  the  precious  balm  of  roseate 
health,  and  the  child  walks  forth  again  to 
blissful  companionship  with  the  birds  and 
flowers. 

We  can  not  understand  these  things. 
They  are  beyond  our  reach ;  and  it  were 
vain  to  try  to  reconcile  them  with  our  narrow 
ideas  of  the  eternal  fitness  of  things.  They 
must  forever  remain  among  those  hidden 


198  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

problems  concerning  which  we  can  only 
speculate,  and  the  solution  of  which,  if  ever, 
must  be  when  man  has  "climbed  the  golden 
stair,"  to  hights  of  wisdom  and  intelligence 
vastly  beyond  that  which  he  now  occupies. 

We  must  accept  the  fact  of  Nature,  with 
all  her  apparent  cruelty  and  injustice,  and  it 
were  folly  to  complain.  Isn't  it  really  better 
to  think  that  what  is  incomprehensible  to  us 
in  our  present  state,  will  sometime  or  other 
be  made  clear  ;  that  Nature's  seeming  indif- 
ference to  us,  and  even  her  apparent  mis- 
takes and  cruelties,  are  all  parts  of  some  plan 
and  purpose,  which,  if  rightly  understood, 
would  seem  divinely  grand  and  beautiful  ? 
May  it  not  be  that  the  storm  and  the  tempest, 
the  lightning  and  the  earthquake,  are  essen- 
tial to  the  unfoldment  of  Nature's  truer  har- 
monies, or  even  to  the  existence  of  life 
itself;  that  sorrow,  suffering  and  death,  are 
all  important  factors  in  the  problem  of  life 
and  happiness  ;  and  that  when  the  veil  shall 
fall  from  our  eyes  and  the  clouds  shall  lift 
from  our  souls,  we  shall  learn  to  realize  that 
it  is  all  for  the  best. 

Ought  we  riot  to  school  our  minds  to  this 


AGREEING    TO    DISAGREE.  199 

faith,  while  at  the  same  time  we  are  ever 
endeavoring  to  discover  what  Nature  means, 
and  seeking-  to  know  more  and  more  of  her 
secret  mysteries?  In  this  faith  we  believe 
life  may  be  made  to  yield  its  best  results, 
and  human  duty  will  become  a  pathway 
strewn  with  flowers. 


AGREEING-  TD  DISAGREE, 


we  have  somewhere  said  in  these 
"  Talks,"  people  differ  most  concerning 
those  things  of  which  they  know  the  least  ; 
and,  generally  they  really  wrangle  and 
quarrel  only  about  what  they  positively 
know  nothing.  The  subject  is  worthy  of  fur- 
ther consideration. 

A  demonstrated  fact  admits  of  no  con- 
troversy. No  intelligent  persons  ever  quar- 
rel about  the  sphericity  of  the  earth,  or 
the  law  of  gravitation  that  holds  the  planets 
in  their  courses.  There  was  a  time  when, 
with  less  knowledge,  they  were  ready  to 


2OO  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

break  each  other's  heads  over  all  such  prop- 
ositions. As  knowledge  increased  in  the 
world  the  once  common  causes  of  disagree- 
ment disappeared,  and  new  and  more  remote 
causes  appeared,  and  are  continually  appear- 
ing, so  that  there  is  seemingly  no  end  to 
the  subject. 

It  is  doubtless  a  part  of  the  great  plan 
that  man  shall  have  something  to  quarrel 
about,  otherwise  he  would  never  arrive  at 
truth.  It  is  the  nature  of  unfolding  intellect 
to  seek  controversy.  Without  the  attrition 
of  mind  with  mind  resulting  therefrom  there 
would  be  no  intellectual  growth.  Man 
would  stagnate  and  relapse  into  a  condition 
of  mental  torpor  scarcely  in  advance  of  that 
of  the  brute.  The  trouble  with  him  is  to 
discriminate  between  the  knowable  and  the 
unknowable,  in  the  matters  he  is  disposed  to 
differ  about  ;  and  yet,  perhaps,  the  very 
lack  of  such  discrimination  is  his  salvation. 
Otherwise  his  capacity  for  knowledge  would 
be  circumscribed  and  his  intellectual  powers 
dwarfed  thereby. 

Man  must  forever  be  reaching  outward 
and  upward  into  the  realm  of  causes — ever 


AGREEING    TO    DISAGREE.  2OI 

grappling  with  the  secret  problems  of  nature 
and  of  his  own  existence — no  matter  whether 
the  solution  of  said  problems  is  within  his 
grasp  or  not.  To  give  up  trying  to  solve 
them  would  be  to  be  false  to  his  own  divine, 
outreaching  nature. 

Therefore,  the  central  thought  which  we 
desire  to  impress  upon  the  minds  of  all  who 
find  in  these  "  Talks  "  any  food  for  reflection, 
is,  that  we  should  gracefully  accept  the  fact 
of  our  many  and  varied  phases  of  disagree- 
ment— in  other  words,  that  we  should  "  agree 
to  disagree,"  and  make  the  best  of  it.  We 
should  endeavor  to  realize,  in  thinking  our 
neighbors  fools  for  not  believing  as  we  do,, 
that  they,  likewise,  are  sure  that  we  are  fools, 
for  not  seeing  things  in  their  light. 

We    should    endeavor    to    appreciate    the 
fact  that  belief  is  the  result  of  conditions  of 
mind  not  always    under  the  control  of  the 
judgment, — religious  belief  especially,  which 
deals,   of  necessity,   more    or  less   with   the 
unknowable.       The    fact    should    make     us 
charitable    and    tolerant  of  the   opinions  of 
others.     It  should  teach  us  our  insignificance 
as  factors  in  the  universe  of  souls.     It  should 


2O2  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

cause  us,  in  the  domain  of  uncertainties,  to 
feel  our  way  cautiously.  It  should  divest  us 
of  all  dogmatism  and  narrowness  of  soul, 
and  improve,  refine  and  ennoble  our  ways  of 
thought. 

Thus  shall  we  grow  in  those  intellectual 
and  spiritual  graces  which  adorn  and  exalt 
manhood,  and  bring  us  nearer  and  nearer 
unto  the  likeness  of  the  Divine. 


ONE  true  friend,  to  whom  you  can  go  for 
sympathy  and  succor  in  your  hour  of  sorest 
need,  and  feel  in  your  soul  that  your  dearest 
confidence  will  never  be  betrayed,  is  worth 
more  to  you  than  a  million  sunshine  flatterers, 
who  fawn  and  smile,  and  dance  around  you, 
in  the  days  of  your  prosperity. 

WHEN  the  Great  Teacher  said,  "  It  is 
easier  for  a  camel  to  go  through  the  eye  of  a 
needle  than  for  a  rich  man  to  enter  into  the 
kingdom  of  God,"  he  probably  knew  what 
he  was  saying.  At  the  same  time  he  doubt- 
less never  intended  to  be  understood  as 
intimating  that  there  was  any  virtue  in  pov- 
erty. 


THRDUG-H  SUFFERING-, 


|HERE  is  a  beautiful  eastern  legend  that 
has  found  expression  in  many  languages. 
It  relates  that  Sandalphon,  the  Angel  of 
Light  and  Glory,  standing  at  the  gates  of 
the  Celestial  City,  gathers  the  fervent  prayers 
and  heart-longings  of  sorrowing  humanity, 
as  they  ascend  ;  they  are  turned  to  flowers 
in  his  hands,  and  their  fragrance  is  wafted 
throughout  the  abode  of  the  immortals.  A 
faithful  and  striking  allegory  this  of  a  great 
law  of  compensation  in  human  suffering. 

While  "  sickness  and  sorrow,  pain  and 
death,"  is  the  common  lot  of  mortals;  yet  some 
there  be  who  seem  born  to  more  than  their 
share  of  ills — if  that  may  be  called  ill,  which, 
in  the  process  of  spiritual  unfoldment,  be- 
comes a  means  of  growth  and  strength. 
There  are  some  natures  so  finely  tuned,  and 
so  sensitive  to  the  discords  and  inharmonies 
of  life,  that  they  suffer  keenly  from  causes 
that  would  scarcely  disturb  the  equanimity  of 
others.  They  feel  the  rough  blasts,  and 


2O4  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

shrink  from  the  cutting  frosts,  when  hardier 
and  tougher  natures  would  withstand  the 
shock  with  scarcely  a  sense  of  weakness. 
One  is  a  sturdy  oak — the  granite  rock  ;  the 
other  the  sensitive  plant — the  fragile,  but  rare 
and  sparkling  crystal. 

Nature's  estimate  of  the  value  of  a  man  is 
his  capacity  for  suffering,  and  the  effect  that 
suffering  has  upon  him.  If  it  fails  to  sweeten, 
purify,  and  ennoble  his  life,  it  is  because  Le 
is  composed  of  base  metal,  which  turns  into 
dross  in  the  furnace  heat  of  affliction.  This 
is  the  diamond  drill  that  tests  the  value  of 
the  entire  lode  of  human  character.  It  is 
the  ladder  that  reaches  to  che  skies,  up  whose 
shining  hights  all  true  souls  are  ever  ascend- 
ing. Suffering  is  as  essential  to  soul-growth 
as  earthly  food  is  to  the  development  of  the 
physical  body.  The  heart  that  has  never 
been  bent  to  the  rack,  nor  felt  the  lacerating 
thong  of  some  great  sorrow,  has  missed  the 
emblazoned  way  to  true  happiness.  "  For 
our  light  affliction,"  says  St.  Paul,-"  which  is 
but  for  a  moment,  worketh  for  us  a  far  more 
exceeding  and  eternal  weight  'of  glory." 
And  thus  the  sorrows  of  the  present  become 


THROUGH    SUFFERING.  205 

the  joys  of  the  future — are  turned  to  flowers 
in  the  hands  of  the  good  angel  that  waits  for 
us  at  the  pearly  gateway  of  the  skies. 

The  common  mishaps,  troubles  and  sorrows 
of  life,  have  their  uses  in  harrowing  and  fer- 
tilizing the  soul,  and  thereby  preparing  it 
for  a  better  harvest  of  good  thoughts  and 
noble  deeds, — just  as  the  farmer  upon  virgin 
soil  oftentimes  finds  it  necessary  to  destroy 
the  brambles  and  weeds  by  fire  in  order  to 
prepare  the  land  for  the  blessed  corn.  Hu- 
man life  needs  fallowing  with  a  keen  plow- 
share to  prepare  it  for  the  golden  harvest  — 
the  luscious  fruitage.  And  the  richer  the 
soil  the  greater  the  necessity  for  careful  and 
thorough  culture,  to  guard  against  the  rank 
growth  of  hurtful  things  ever  ready  to  creep 
in  and  choke  out  the  precious  plants. 

What  tired  and  patient  soul,  approaching 
the  gentle  rest  of  death,  with  cairn  resigna- 
tion and  unclouded  trust,  and  looking  back 
over  a  life  of  many  cares  and  sorrows,  but 
feels  to  rejoice  in  every  pang  it  has  suffered 
—in  every  tear  it  has  shed?  It  would  not, 
if  it  could,  have  borne  or  endured  a  single 
sorrow  or  heart-ache  less.  Even  in  this  life, 


2O5  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

with  all  grand  souls,  do  not  their  trials  and 
struggles  turn  to  flowers,  exhaling  the  sweet 
fragrance  of  beautiful  thoughts  to  bless  and 
enrich  the  world  ? 

Of  all  grand  inspirations  of  genius  that 
have  marked  the  eras  of  human  history,  and 
left  their  impress  upon  the  monumental 
records  of  time — in  literature,  art,  song,  in- 
vention,— the  grandest  and  best  have  been 
born  of  heart-throes  of  which  the  world  has 
little  dreamed.  From  altars  where  souls 
have  bled,  and  brows  have  been  pierced 
with  crowns  of  cruel  thorns,  have  leapt  forth 
lightnings  that  have  thrilled  the  world,  and 
marked  a  shining  pathway  for  other  feet  to 
follow.  From  Gethsemanes  of  anguish  and 
tears  have  been  voiced  lessons  of  charity,  of 
gentle  humanity  and  love,  that  have  awakened 
slumbering  echoes  in  benighted  souls,  the 
world  over,  that  shall  reverbrate  through  all 
time. 

Tired  hearts,  suffering  souls,  ye  who  have 
borne  the  burdens  of  cruel  wrongs,  and 
trodden  the  thorny  ways  of  the  world  with 
bleeding  feet,  take  heart  and  hope  in  the 
thought  that  the  time  will  surely  come  when 


JOB  S    QUERY.  2O7 

your  troubles  will  all  be  turned  to  flowers, 
whose  joyful  fragrance  shall  exhale  in  bless- 
ings and  gladness  forevermore. 


JOB'S  QUERY, 


Sffi|N  all  ages  of  the  world  intelligent  human- 
181  ity  everywhere  has  puzzled  its  brain  over 
Job's  query  :  "  If  a  man  die,  shall  he  live 
again  ?"  And,  as  in  the  science,  philosophy 
and  religion  of  his  day,  Job  found  no  answer 
to  his  question,  and  was  inclined  to  believe, 
with  "  the  Preacher,"  that  in  aught  that  per- 
tained to  an  existence  beyond  this  life,  "  man 
hath  no  pre-eminence  above  a  beast  ;"  so,  a 
vast  multitude  of  the  sons  of  earth,  to-day, 
are  disposed  to  accept  Job's  view  of  the 
matter,  and  with  him  to  say  :  "As  the 
waters  fail  from  the  sea,  and  the  flood  de- 
cayeth  and  dryeth  up,  so  man  lieth  down  and 
riseth  not :  till  the  heavens  be  no  more, 
they  shall  not  awake  nor  be  raised  out  of 
their  sleep." 


2O8  OUR  SUNDAY    TALKS. 

It  is  claimed  by  the  materialist  that  the 
idea  of  continued  existence  is  the  outgrowth 
of  education  ;  that  the  desire  for  such  exist- 
ence is  unnatural,  and  has  no  place  in  the 
mind,  except  as  it  is  implanted  there  by 
erroneous  teaching.  And  nature,  at  the 
first  thought,  seems  to  bear  him  out  in  his 
conclusions.  We  find  man  and  the  higher 
forms  of  life  below  him,  to  be  very  nearly 
the  same  in  physical  structure.  There  is 
the  same  muscular,  arterial,  osseous  and 
nervous  systems.  The  blood  is  of  the  same 
color,  and  it  is  re-charged  with  oxygen  in 
the  same  way.  Life  is  sustained  by  the  same 
process  in  the  one  as  in  the  other.  And 
then,  leaving  the  domain  of  the  physical,  he 
finds  much  in  the  mental  nature  that  is  similar 
in  kind — affection,  memory,  locality,  calcula- 
tion ;  and  sometimes  he  finds  manifestations 
of  intelligence  trenching  so  closely  upon  the 
human  that  it  is  difficult  to  define  the  dif- 
ference. 

Following  this  strictly  physical  and  mental 
similarity  between  the  so-called  dumb  brute 
and  the  human  being,  the  scientific  material- 
ist points  us  to  types  of  sav  ge  life  scarcely  a 


JOB  S    QUERY.  209 

grade  above  the  higher  simious  forms,  and  the 
believer  in  immortality,  by  faith  or  otherwise, 
is  puzzled  with  the  question,  "  At  what  point 
in  the  scale  of  being  does  the  capacity  for 
immortality  begin  ?"  Other  perplexing 
questions  arise  as  to  the  nature  of  that  part 
or  element  of  man  for  which  religion  claims 
an  eternity  of  existence.  Is  it  an  individual- 
ized entity  ?  Has  it  shape,  memory,  passion, 
will  ?  Where  does  it  dwell  and  how  does  it 
exist  ?  In  short,  what  is  it  ?  And  then  if 
man  only  is  immortal,  would  not  the  hunter 
be  lost  without  the  companionship  of  his 
faithful  hound — the  Arab  without  his  trusty 
steed  ? 

It  would  be  entirely  foreign  to  our  purpose 
in  these  "Talks"  to  attempt  any  elaborate 
disquisition  upon  these  or  any  other  ques- 
tions. We  aim  rather  to  catch  a  few  practi- 
cal and  pointed  thoughts  on  each  theme  we 
attempt  to  consider,  and  impinge  the  same 
upon  the  consciousness  of  our  readers — not 
always  so  much  by  way  of  instruction  as  to 
arouse  thought  in  their  minds. 

Now  there  is  no  intelligent  materialist  but 
will  admit  that  there  are  phases  and  phenom- 


2IO  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

ena  of  mind  which  are  entirely  inexplicable 
upon  any  known  theory  of  the  laws  of  mat- 
ter, and  which  certainly  strongly  indicate  that 
this  life  is  not  the  all  of  being.  Take,  for 
instance,  the  fact  of  somnambulism,  showing 
the  operation  of  mind  independent  of  its 
usual  channels  of  communication  ;  mesmer- 
ism, demonstrating  the  power  of  one  mind 
over  the  mind  and  body  of  another,  operating, 
often,  at  long  distances  ;  clairvoyance,  clair- 
audience,  and  the  various  and  well  attested 
phenomena  of  modern  spiritualism,  all  "  foot- 
falls on  the  boundaries  of  another  world," 
and  pointing  to  an  almost  positive  affirmation 
of  Job's  question. 

And  then  again,  admitting  that  the  desire 
for  continued  existence  is  the  result  of  educa- 
tion, the  capacity  for  such  educated  desire 
inheres  only  in  man,  and  not  at  all,  as  far  as 
we  know,  in  types  of  animal  life  below  man 
Because  man  desires  immortality  may  be  no 
evidence  or  argument  that  his  desire  will 
ever  be  gratified.  At  the  same  time,  we 
notice,  that  in  the  material  world  nature  aims 
to  perfect  whatever  she  undertakes.  Why 
should  she  leave  her  grandest  work — the 


JOB  S    QUERY.  2  I  I 

intellectual  and  spiritual  nature  of  man — all 
incomplete,  with  its  longings  and  outreach- 
ings  all  unsatisfied,  its  unfoldment  but  just 
begun  ?  Man  lives  here  but  a  little  while, 
learns  some  few  things  imperfectly,  and  is 
cut  off  just  upon  the  threshold  of  that  de- 
velopment that  he  feels  he  is  capable  of,  and 
ought,  in  the  purposes  of  his  being,  to  be 
allowed  to  accomplish.  Denied  this,  he  feels 
that  he  would  be  made  an  unfair  exception 
to  the  creative  law  of  the  universe,  and  he 
rebels  against  the  thought  in  every  atom  of 
his  being. 

But,  whether  man  lives  again,  or  not,  he 
is  tolerably  sure  of  an  existence  here.  He 
should  make  the  most  of  his  present  oppor- 
tunities, and  get  all  the  good  out  of  life  he 
possibly  can  ;  and  this  can  be  done  only  by 
doing  the  greatest  possible  amount  of  good 
to  others. 


MOTHERS  who  worry  and  fret,  and  scold 
and  borrow  trouble,  about  what  they  can  not 
help,  only  make  themselves  miserable,  with- 
out securing  any  compensating  benefit. 


212  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 


N~DT  TD  BE  WONDERED  AT, 


is  not  to  be  wondered  at  that  men  and 
women,  with  keenly  sensitive  natures, 
often  become  cynical  and  morose,  if  not 
wholly  disgusted  with,  and  tired  of  the 
world,  There  is  so  much  to  worry  and 
annoy  such  natures — so  much  inharmony 
and  rasping  discord  to  contend  with,  that 
they  find  themselves  incapable  of  bearing  up 
under  the  burdens  of  life.  Especially  is  this 
the  case  where  they  are  obliged,  for  physical 
sustenance,  to  eater  the  lists  in  the  competi- 
tive struggle  for  bread.  To  be  jostled 
against  and  misunderstood  by  coarser  na- 
tures, pushed  aside  and  crowded  to  the  wall 
by  brawnier  muscle,  and  to  see  the  morsel 
that  should  have  been  theirs  seized  upon  and 
devoured  by  the  grasping  and  greedy  crowd, 
is  not  calculated  to  sweeten  one's  disposition 
— unless  one  is  so  schooled  in  the  philosophy 
of  life  as  to  be  able  to  accept  all  things  for 
the  best. 

Life  is  too  short  to  enable  the  most  thought- 

o 


NOT  TO  BE  WONDERED  AT.  213 

ful  mind  to  fully  comprehend  the  situation— 
to  take  in  and  realize,  much  less  to  analyze, 
its  relations  with  the  universe  and  with  itself. 
Man  opens  his  eyes  for  a  little  while  on  a 
wonderful  panorama  of  field  and  sky,  of 
ocean  and  desert,  of  marvelous  manifesta- 
tions of  intelligence  and  strange  conflicts  of 
ideas.  He  finds  himself  a  conscious  and 
sentient  entity — an  atom  clinging  to  a 
globule  of  condensed  nebulae,  whirling  through 
the  mighty  voids  of  space.  His  abode  is 
one  of  the  least  of  untold  millions  of  similar 
globes,  and  for  aught  he  knows  he  may  be 
least  among  the  vast  hosts  of  conscious  atoms 
peopling  the  same.  He  opens  his  eyes  upon 
all  these  marvels,  catches  but  a  bare  glance 
of  things,  and  then  the  curtain  falls,  the  show 
is  ended,  and  the  spectator  goes  to  his  long 
home. 

In  all  this  brief  and  flitting  glance, — but 
nevertheless  to  the  man  of  thought  and  cul- 
ture, a  broad  and  comprehensive  view  of 
the  universe  of  mind  and  matter,— and  es- 
pecially in  his  apparent  littleness,  and  in  the 
inferior  quality  of  his  fellow  atoms,  he  sees 
and  realizes  his  own  insignificance  in  the 


214  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

great  universal  plan,  and  he  is  led  to  exclaim 
with  Job,  "  What  is  man  that  Thou  shouldst 
be  mindful  of  him?"  This  sense  of  littleness 
and  inferiority — a  feeling  all  unknown  except 
to  truly  noble  souls — is  apt  to  prey  upon  a 
sensitive  nature  until  the  man  actually  comes 
to  think  that  he  is  of  no  possible  account  in 
the  world  ;  and  then,  when  brought  into 
disagreeable  and  unavoidable  contact  with 
rude  and  ignoble  natures,  as  he  inevitably 
must  be,  the  result  is  often  more  than  he  can 
bear.  He  loses  his  grip,  as  it  were,  and 
misses  the  glorious  opportunity  for  spiritual 
and  intellectual  unfoldment  which  life  affords. 

We  pity  the  soul  who  finds  no  joy  in  the 
world — who  sees  only  the  shadows,  and 
never  basks  in  the  glorious  sunshine.  It  is 
a  soul  out  of  tune  with  the  real  harmonies  of 
nature.  For  though  nature  has  its  dark 
sides — its  clashing  inharmonies, — it  has  also 
its  realms  of  gladness — its  divine  melodies. 
And  misguided  indeed  is  that  man  or  woman 
who  dwells  perpetually  in  the  one,  and  never 
seeks  out  or  learns  the  joys  of  the  other. 

We  insist  that  the  true  theory  of  life  is  to 
make  the  most  and  best  of  it,  under  all  cir- 


NOT  TO  BE  WONDERED  AT.  215 

cumstances  and  all  conditions.  To  endeavor 
to  right  the  wrongs  of  society,  to  help  the 
"  weary  and  heavy  laden"  on  his  way,  to 
speak  the  gentle  word  that  carries  peace  and 
rest  to  the  troubled  soul,  to  bless  the  widow 
and  the  fatherless  in  their  affliction,  to  ad- 
monish the  erring  in  the  spirit  of  charity  and 
love,  to  make  the  moral  wastes  of  the  world 
to  blossom  as  the  rose, — in  all  this  and  more, 
man  can  find  no  time  to  grow  cynical  or 
sour — no  moment  when  he  may  not  be  add- 
ing to  the  stature  and  glory  of  his  own  man- 
hood, and  fitting  himself  more  and  more  for 
that  life  which  we  believe  will  bourgeon  and 
blossom  for  him  "  within  the  vail,"  forever- 
more. 


As  man  ascends  the  scale  of  being  he  will 
take  less  and  less  delight  in  all  sports  or 
pastimes  that  inflict  pain  upon  dumb  brutes. 
He  will  find  his  enjoyments  in  those  higher 
delights  of  the  soul  that  exalt  even  as  they 
gratify. 

TAXATION  without  representation  is  as  great 
a  wrong  to  woman  as  it  ever  was  to  man. 


2l6  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

AFTER  ALL, 


[OCIETY  is  so  accustomed  to  weigh  men 
by  their  success  in  acquiring-  property  that 
many  a  man  counts  his  life  a  failure  who,  dying, 
leaves  no  stores  of  earthly  treasures  for  his 
heirs  to  quarrel  over.  Never  was  there  a 
greater  mistake.  A  man's  coin  value  is 
really  his  lowest  and  meanest  value.  Wealth 
is  often  his  ruination,  generally  his  curse, 
and  always  a  source  of  annoyance  and  care. 
The  acquisition  of  a  reasonable  amount  of 
property — enough  to  ward  off  the  possibility 
of  want  in  old  age — is  both  desirable  and 
commendable.  But  that  once  obtained,  and 
absolutely  assured,  life,  surely,  has  other 
objects  that  are  infinitely  nobler  than  the 
continued  piling  up  of  wealth.  Many  a  man, 
with  the  acquisitive  faculty  largely  developed, 
gathers  in  wealth  for  the  purpose  of  doing 
good  with  it,  and  after  scattering  kindness 
and  sunshine  all  along  his  path,  manages  to 
come  out  about  even  in  the  end.  Such  a 
man  has  lived  to  some  purpose,  and  we  doubt 


AFTER    ALL.  2  I  7 

not  has  got  out  of  life  more  solid  happiness 
in  each  month  of  his  existence  than  ever 
Moneybags  obtained  from  his  dollars  in  his 
whole  lifetime.  The  only  true  measurement 
of  a  man  and  the  highest  standard  of  his 
valuation,  is  character.  If  he  bears  about 
him  the  genuine  article  stamped  and  regis- 
tered in  the  mint  of  true  manhood,  he  is  rich, 
and  never  otherwise.  Many  of  the  greatest 
benefactors  of  the  world — the  master  minds 
whose  names  will  go  down  to  remotest  time 
— never  had  time  to  acquire  worldly  riches  ; 
and  yet  they  are  the  Rothchilds,  Stewarts 
and  Astors,  of  the  world  of  soul.  What  is 
the  use,  then,  of  wasting  one's  best  energies 
for  what  one  really  does  not  need  ?  For 
after  all,  life  is  a  success  or  failure  only  in 
proportion  to  its  accumulation  of  those  treas- 
ures of  heart  and  brain  that  endure  forever. 


IF  the  acquisitive  faculty  was  the  highest 
faculty  of  the  human  brain  Providence  would 
have  located  it  in  the  arch  of  the  temple,  and 
not  crowded  it  off  among  combativeness, 
secretiveness,  and  the  other  animal  faculties. 


2l8  OUR   SUNDAY  TALKS. 


HARMLESS  SELF-CONCEIT, 


IHERE  are  many  excellent  people  in 
the  world  who  will  confidently  tell  us 
such  amazing  things  of  Deity — of  His  majesty, 
power,  purposes,  laws, — and  have  such  con- 
fidence in  their  ability  to  influence  or  per- 
suade Him  in  matters  that  He  might  possibly 
overlook  or  forget, — that  one  would  naturally 
conclude  they  must  be  on  terms  of  peculiar 
intimacy  with  the  Creator.  This  is  a  harm- 
less species  of  self-conceit,  so  long  as  it  is 
dominated  by  a  sincere  desire  for  the  highest 
welfare  of  humanity.  We  care  but  little 
what  kind  of  theology  a  man  believes  in, 
^provided  he  is  actuated  and  permeated  by 
genuine  love  for  his  fellow  men.  He  may 
claim  that  the  universe  was  created  in  six 
days  or  six  thousand  aeons  ;  he  may  locate 
the  time  and  place,  and  believe  that  the  hu- 
man race  obtained  its  start  by  a  special 
creation  of  a  perfect  pair  in  the  Garden  of 
Eden,  or  that  it  ascended,  by  the  slow  pro- 


HARMLESS    SELF-CONCEIT.  2IQ 

cess  of  evolution,  from  a  mollusk  or  a  mon- 
key ;  he  may  think  he  knows  that  the  first 
created  pair  fell  from  their  high  and  holy 
estate  through  the  wiles  of  a  mischievous 
being  who  succeeded  in  circumventing  his 
and  their  Creator  ;  he  may  believe  all  this, 
and  as  much  more,  or  less,  as  he  can  find  it 
in  his  nature  to  believe  ;  but  if  his  heart  is 
warm  with  the  divine  impulse  of  good  will 
to  man,  he  is  our  friend  and  brother.  We 
have  no  quarrel  with  him.  Indeed  we  can 
respect  his  opinions  for  his  sake,  and  for  the 
good  there  is  in  him. 

But  independent  of  all  this  assumed  knowl- 
edge, and  all  of  the  marvelous  riddles  and 
hidden  things  of  the  universe,  concerning 
which  we  can  only  speculate  and  theorize, 
there  are  some  important  facts — all-important 
for  humanity  to  know — that  are  plainly  with- 
in the  reach  of  human  knowledge.  We 
know  there  is  a  life  principle  permeating 
matter,  and  pushing  upward  and  outward 
into  countless  forms.  Whether  this  princi- 
ple inheres  in,  and  is  a  property  of,  matter, 
solely,  or  is  a  something  behind  and  inde- 
pendent of  matter,  is  not  essential  to  our 


22O  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

welfare  or  happiness.  The  central  fact  of 
the  existence  of  such  a  principle  can  no  more 
be  questioned  than  we  can  question  the  fact 
of  our  own  existence. 

In  the  operations  of  this  principle,  or  law 
of  matter,  as  some  prefer  to  term  it,  we 
notice  that  it  is  ever  reaching  out  through 
nature  for  the  best.  It  is  never  satisfied 
with  inferiority  or  mediocrity  ;  but,  through 
all  the  countless  cycles  of  time,  is  ever  ex- 
perimenting, as  it  were,  and  trying  and  re- 
trying to  produce  something  better  and 
better.  The  air  we  breathe  has  undergone 
wonderful  changes,  since  the  earlier  geologic 
eras,  and  is  capable  of  sustaining  vastly 
superior  forms  of  life  now  to  what  it  could 
then.  This  is  evident  from  the  crude  and 
extinct  forms  of  vegetable  and  animal  life 
folded  away  in  the  coal  and  chalk  beds,  or 
that  have  left  their  impress  in  the  older  rocks. 

We  trace  humanity  back  along  the  line  of 
human  history  until  we  see  man  emerging 
from  the  mists  and  shadows  of  antiquity,  a 
mere  savage,  brutal  and  ignorant — a  dweller 
in  caves,  and  clad  in  the  skins  of  wild  beasts 
— whose  highest  ambition  was  carnage  and 


HARMLESS    SELF-CONCEIT.  221 

conquest.  We  see  him  to-day  crowned  with 
the  garnered  wisdom  of  the  past,  sitting  as 
king  over  new  realms  of  thought,  with  the 
prisoned  vapors  of  the  cloud  and  the  tamed 
coursers  of  the  storm  obedient  to  his  call. 
Hence,  we  would  conclude  that  man  is  no 
exception  to  Nature's  progressive  law — that 
he  is  undergoing  a  process  of  intellectual  and 
spiritual  growth  and  unfoldment  that  is  limited 
and  circumscribed  only  by  eternity  on  the 
one  side,  and  his  own  infinite  capacity  on 
the  other. 

Realizing  this  fact,  and  that  Nature  is  ever 
calling  to  man  by  her  myriad  voices  to  come 
up  higher — to  ascend  the  scale  of  being  to  a 
companionship  with  his  higher  ideals — what 
sort  of  beings  ought  we  to  be  ?  Who,  with 
such  possibilities  before  him,  would  be  con- 
tent to  grovel  in  the  muck  and  mire  of  an 
ignoble  life,  and  feed  on  husks  and  garbage, 
when  he  has  but  to  put  forth  his  hand  to 
pluck  the  golden  fruits  of  paradise  ? 


A  SWEET  disposition,  in  man  or  woman,  is 
a  jewel  outshining  the  rarest  of  earthly  gems. 


222  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 


PARENTAL  G-DYERNMENT, 


iRAIN  up  a  child  in  the  way  he  should 
go,"  said  the  wise  man,  "  and  when  he 
is  old  he  will  not  depart  from  it."  That 
depends  somewhat,  Solomon,  on  the  kind  of 
child  you  undertake  to  train  up.  We  have 
seen  children,  under  the  most  strict  and  care- 
ful training,  go  to  the  bad  in  spite  of  every 
wholesome  restraint ;  while  others,  who- 
have  come  up  without  much  of  any  training, 
have  turned  out  to  be  good  and  useful  men 
and  women.  Thus,  we  believe  a  great  deal  de- 
pends upon  the  inherited  tendencies  and  quali- 
ties of  the  child,  as  to  whether  or  not  it  will 
walk  in  the  way  it  is  trained  to  go.  It  is  a 
well  understood  law  of  nature  that  like  begets 
like,  and  that  children  are  very  apt  to  inherit 
the  moral  weaknesses  and  imperfections  of 
their  progenitors,  and  especially  are  they  apt  to- 
be  endowed  with  inharmonious  and  badly  or- 
ganized natures  as  the  results  of  the  ignor- 
ance or  indifference  of  the  parents  concerning; 


PARENTAL    GOVERNMENT.  223 

the  laws  governing  the  ante-natal  conditions 
of  life.  . 

No  man  or  woman  bearing  the  taint  of 
scrofula  or  consumption  in  their  blood,  or 
who  can  not  control  their  own  natural  ten- 
dencies to  evil,  should  ever  reproduce  their 
kind, — no  man  addicted  to  the  intemperate 
use  of  liquor,  opium  or  tobacco, — no  thief, 
nor  gambler,  nor  murderer  ; — unless  they 
would  perpetuate  their  own  evil  propensities 
in  the  world,  and  add  to  the  sum  of  human 
misery. 

Now,  as  to  tne  training  up  of  children  in 
the  way  they  should  go  :  The  first  and 
most  important  qualification  is  for  the  parents 
to  take  Josh  Billings' advice  and  "go  that 
way  themselves."  The  proper  method  of 
correcting,  children  is  one  most  difficult  to 
learn.  The  nature  and  temper  of  the  child 
must  be  thoroughly  understood  ;  for  what 
will  benefit  one  may  ruin  another.  The  rod 
is  a  necessary  implement  of  family  govern- 
ment only  with  those  parents  who  do  not 
know  how  to  govern  by  better  and  higher 
methods.  The  old  adage,  "  spare  the  rod 
and  spoil  the  child,"  had  its  origin  in  an  age 


224  OUR  SUNDAY   TALKS. 

of  semi-barbarism,  and  in  a  false  idea  of 
parental  discipline.  Many  a  boy,  driven 
away  from  his  home  by  parental  cruelty,  has 
gone  forth  into  the  world  with  all  filial  love 
crushed  out  of  his  heart.  The  blow  that 
arouses  anger,  or  deadens  the  love  of  a 
child  for  a  parent,  is  an  unfortunate  one,  and 
should  never  be  given.  No  child,  with  any 
proper  degree  of  spirit,  and  a  fair  amount  of 
intelligence,  that  has  arrived  at  years  border- 
ing on  manhood  or  womanhood,  will  tamely 
submit  to  physical  chastisement.  Of  course 
there  may  be  natures  so  barren  of  the  better 
promptings  and  impulses  of  humanity,  that 
the  infliction  of  physical  pain  is  the  shortest 
way  to  their  consciousness.  But  even  in 
such  cases  we  seriously  question  whether 
the  shortest  is  the  best  way. 

The  most  successful  horse-trainers  are 
those  who  make  the  least  possible  use  of  the 
whip.  The  mind  of  the  young  child  may  be 
influenced  in  like  manner^  by  gentle  per- 
suasion. Before  arriving  at  years  of  dis- 
cretion, it  may  be  encouraged  by  rewards  in 
ways  of  well  doing,  and  checked  by  gentle 
restraints  from  its  perverse  purposes.  The 


PARENTAL    GOVERNMENT.  225 

children  of  parents  who  use  the  rod  un- 
sparingly, and  who  do  not  run  away  from 
home  as  soon  as  they  are  able  to  take  care 
of  themselves,  are  generally  noted  for  their 
stupidity  and  worthlessness. 

The  family  bond  of  union  should  embrace 
every  member  of  the  household.  Children 
should  be  made  to  realize  that  in  all  the  wide 
world  their  parents  are  their  best  friends. 
They  should  learn  to  confide  in  them,  and  to 
love  their  homes.  But  it  is  only  the  out- 
reaching,  tender  hand  of  parental  love  that 
can  call  forth  this  love  in  the  child.  Anger, 
petulance,  fault-finding  and  cruelty,  will 
never  do  it.  Mothers  who  scold  and  fret, 
and  fathers  who  beat  and  bruise,  surely  can 
not  realize  the  mischief  they  are  doing. 

If  a  son  or  a  daughter  manifests  a  dispo- 
sition to  go  astray,  take  them,  father, 
mother,  to  your  loving  arms  and  heart,  and 
gently  and  tenderly  teach  them  the  better 
way.  If  this  will  not  save  them  nothing  on 
earth  will.  The  memory  of  your  tender  care 
and  loving  counsels  they  will  never  forget 
It  will  cling  to  them  through  all  their  future 
years,  like  the  whispered  words  of  a  dying 


226  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

mother's  prayer,-  —  ever  prompting  and  guid- 
ing" them  in  the  right  whenever  their  way- 
ward feet  would  go  astray. 

Here  is  the  secret  of  all  true  parental  gov- 
ernment. And  it  is  this  principle  that  con- 
stitutes the  chief  factor  in  all  human  reform. 
It  is  Omnipotent  love  working  through 
humanity.  It  is  the  key  to  heaven. 


SUNSET, 


IHERE  is  no  more  suggestive  or  beautiful 
sight,  to  our  eyes,  than  that  of  an  elderly 
married  couple,  who,  trustingly  and  lovingly, 
together  have  walked  the  rugged  ways  of 
life,  from  youth  to  old  age  ;  and  now,  hand 
in  hand,  and  heart  to  heart,  are  patiently 
and  hopefully  waiting  upon  the  hither  shore 
of  time  for  the  sound  of  the  boatman's  oar, 
that  shall  bear  them  across  the  silent  river. 
We  look  back  along  the  dim  vista  of  years 
to  the  halcyon  time  of  life's  sunny  morning. 
We  witness  their  plighted  vows  at  the  altar, 


• 

OF  T 

UNIVERSH 

SUNSET.    .  227 


and  see  them  go  forth,  in  the  pride  and 
glory  of  their  young  wedded  lives,  to  the 
toils  and  struggles  of  existence.  Many  a 
Godspeed  and  kind  word  of  cheer  fall  upon 
their  ears,  as  they  go  out  from  beneath  the 
parental  roof-tree  that  is  to  shelter  them  no 
more  forever.  Before  them  lies  a  new 
world  of  experiences  —  of  joys  and  sorrows— 
of  grand  successes,  and  perhaps  of  sad  fail- 
ures. But  strong  of  purpose  and  resolute  of 
will,  and  with  life's  sky  rose-tinted  with  the 
flush  of  dawn,  they  move  on,  and  enter  upon 
this,  to  them,  all  unexplored  world  of  ex- 
periences. 

We  see  them  later  established  in  their 
new  home.  Perhaps  it  is  a  log  cabin  in  the 
wilderness,  with  neighbors  few  and  far  ;  or 
maybe  a  cosy  little  cottage  in  some  distant 
town.  The  husband  is  bravely  bending 
every  energy  to  the  task  of  mastering  the 
hard  conditions  of  life  —  of  carving  out  a  home 
and  a  name  in  the  world,  and  securing,  if 
possible,  that  independence  that  shall  relieve 
them  from  the  possibility  of  want.  To  the 
wife's  once  rosy  cheeks  has  come  the  pallor 
of  the  dreadful  agonies  of  maternity  ;  but 


228  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

now  her  eyes  are  bright  with  a  new  hope,  as 
she  caresses  the  tiny  form  that  nestles  in  her 
bosom. 

And  then  come  added  cares  and  heart- 
aches as  the  years  glide  away.  I  see  them, 
with  streaming  eyes  and  pleading  lips,  bend- 
ing over  the  couch  of  their  darling  one,  as 
its  little  life  flutters  away  in  the  short  gasps 
of  dissolution,  and  its  eyes  grow  dim  under 
the  touch  of  Death's  icy  fingers.  But 
anon,  time  pours  its  gentle  balm  into  their 
wounded  hearts,  and  the  bitter  trial  and  loss, 
which  they  thought  they  could  never  endure, 
fades  away  into  a  tender  memory. 

Again  we  behold  them,  and  as  in  the  long 
ago  they  went  forth  into  the  world,  now 
their  own  noble  sons  and  daughters,  bur- 
dened with  the  unsolved  problems  and  un- 
tried responsibilities  of  life,  follow  in  their 
footsteps  ;  and  soon  their  home  is  left  unto 
them  desolate,  save  in  the  companionship  of 
their  own  chastened  souls.  Well  for  them 
now  if  they  find  within  themselves  treasures 
of  culture  and  character  that  shall  supply 
their  dearest  need.  Well  for  them,  if 
schooled  in  that  beautiful  philosophy  that 


SUNSET.  229 

enabled  St.  Paul  to  say  :  "  I  have  fought  a 
good  fight,  I  have  finished  my  course,  I  have 
kept  the  faith,"  they,  too,  can  feel  in  their 
souls  that  they  have  done  the  best  they 
knew,  and  that  now  they  will  trust  the  good 
Father  for  all  that  is  to  come. 

The  shadows  stretch  away  in  lengthening- 
lines  toward  the  east ;  and  now  they  are 
calmly  watching  the  glories  of  the  coming 
sunset — the  sunset  of  a  well-spent  life.  How 
grand  they  seem,  in  the  fruition  of  their 
years,  with  their  silvered  hair  glowing  in  the 
sunset's  golden  gleam.  Their  faces  are 
radiant  with  a  divine  hope  that  beyond  the 
bars  of  the  shining  west  the  beckoning  arms 
of  their  loved  ones  are  outreaching  towards 
them  to  welcome  them  to  their  home  of 
eternal  rest  and  love  ;  and  that  in  a  few 
more  days,  or  years  at  most,  they  will  pass 
on,  as  one,  weary  with  the  burdens  of  the 
day,  "  gathers  the  drapery  of  his  couch  about 
him,  and  lies  down  to  pleasant  dreams." 


IT  doesn't  hurt  a  good  wife  to  praise  her 
occasionally. 


230  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 


R  DAY  DF  REST, 


ILESSED  be  the  man  that  invented 
sleep,"  said  Sancho  Panza  ;  but  thrice 
blessed  he,  say  we,  who  invented  Sunday. 
To  be  able,  for  one  glad  day  in  seven,  to 
cast  aside  all  business  care,  and  to  find  a 
brief  surcease  from  the  turmoil,  the  excite- 
ments and  the  worry  of  life,  is  surely  a  price- 
less boon  to  humanity,  and  one  that  the 
great  Christian  world  does  not  fully  appre- 
ciate. 

While  we  are  no  Sabbatarian  in  the  re- 
ligious sense  of  the  word — believing  that  all 
days  alike  are  holy,  as  Nature  is  holy,  and 
that  all  are  made  for  the  profit  and  unfold- 
ment  of  halting,  struggling,  and  yet  really 
progressive  humanity, — still  we  are  deeply 
grateful  for  the  institution  of  the  Christian 
Sunday.  And  for  the  sake  of  those  who 
especially  venerate  the  day,  and  for  our  own 
sakes,  we  would  make  it  as  free  from  all 
secular  pursuits  as  possible.  Neither  would 


A    DAY    OF    REST.  23! 

we  permit  any  who  choose  to  devote  the 
day  to  pleasurable  enjoyment  in  any  manner 
to  disturb  the  quiet  and  religious  devotion  of 
those  who  believe  that  a  special  sanctity 
attaches  thereto. 

Of  course  there  are  many  necessary  pur- 
suits of  life  where  the  observance  of  Sunday 
as  a  day  of  entire  cessation  from  physical 
labor  is  either  impossible,  or  would  work  a 
serious  detriment  to  the  laudable  work  of  the 
world, — such  as  the  navigation  of  the  high 
seas,  railroading,  and  many  mechanical  pur- 
suits where  cessation  of  labor  would  work 
serious  waste. 

And  here  we  see  and  recognize  the  fitness 
of  the  idea  that  "  Sunday  was  made  for  man/' 
—that  is,  in  the  nature  of  things,  the  day 
must  necessarily  be  made  flexible  to  fit  the 
inexorable  and  unyielding  circumstances  of 
humanity.  These  exceptions  to  the  observ- 
ance of  Sunday  should  cause  no  uneasiness 
to  religious  people,  and  do  not  with  those  of 
any  breadth  of  thought.  They  need  not 
have  the  slightest  apprehension  that  the  day 
will  ever  be  turned  into  one  of  general  busi- 
ness, or  lost  in  the  whirl  or  waste,  of  the 


232  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

world.  It  trenches  too  closely  on  man's 
necessities  ever  to  be  cast  aside.  On  the 
other  hand,  it  will  grow  upon  the  world  just 
in  proportion  as  society  becomes  enlightened, 
and  the  improving  conditions  of  humanity 
will  permit. 

And  so,  while  we  may  not  fully  subscribe 
to  the  reason  of  the  pious  poet  for  rejoicing 
for  the  gift  of  the  Christian  Sabbath,  never- 
theless we  are  not  so  bigoted  as  to  be  un- 
willing to  join  with  him  in  the  glad  refrain— 

"  Welcome  sweet  day  of  rest — 

That  saw  the  Lord  arise; 
Welcome  to  this  reviving  breast, 
And  these  rejoicing  eyes." 


THE  pampered  daughter  of  luxury  who 
turns  up  her  nose  at  an  honest,  industrious 
mechanic,  or  worthy  laborer  of  any  kind, 
may  see  the  time  when  a  five  dollar  gold 
piece  will  look  bigger  to  her  than  a  cart 
wheel. 

THE  man,  in  this  age,  who  selfishly  lives 
for  himself  alone,  was  born  ten  thousand 
years  too  late. 


LIFE'S  FIRST  LESSONS, 


|O  the  young  man  just  entering  upon  the 
stage  of  active  life,  and  who  ought  to 
be  forming  a  character  that  shall  constitute  a 
sinking  fund  against  the  emergencies  of  life 
and  the  ravages  of  time,  we  have  a  few 
words  to  say. 

In  the  first  place,  my  young  friend,  you 
must  learn  the  hard  lesson  that  if  ever  you 
expect  to  amount  to  anything  in  life 
you  must  work  for  it.  If  nature  has  given 
you  a  capacious  brain,  that  is  your  good 
luck,  for  which  you  should  be  thankful. 
You  should  modestly  accept  the  gift,  and 
set  yourself  at  the  task  of  improving  the 
same.  Nature  turns  out  her  diamonds 
always  in  the  rough.  The  polishing  and  cut- 
ting are  the  work  of  man.  On  the  other 
hand,  if  Nature  has  been  less  bountiful  with 
you,  then  the  greater  the  necessity  for 
harder  work.  Many  an  inferior  quality  of 
brain,  by  energetic  application,  has  been  made 
to  evolve  a  high  order  of  manhood. 


234  °UR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

You  should  first  endeavor  to  find  out 
what  you  were  intended  for,  and  then  direct 
all  your  energies  in  that  direction.  Many  a 
good  mechanic  has  been  spoiled  under  the 
mistaken  notion  that  he  was  best  fitted  for  a 
professional  life  ;  and  many  a  fine  brain  has 
been  deprived  of  advantages  that,  if  properly 
improved  upon,  would  have  given  a  genius 
to  the  world.  And  once  on  the  right  track 
turn  neither  to  the  right  nor  the  left  ;  and 
above  all,  work — work  early  and  late — work 
with  a  will  that  will  brook  no  denial  or  defeat. 

He  who  would  win  must  struggle  for  the 
prize.  He  can  find  no  time  for  idleness, 
dissipation  or  folly.  He  is  supplied  with  a 
certain  amount  of  vitality — none  too  much. 
He  has  not  a  particle  to  waste  in  foolishness 
of  any  kind.  Are  you  aware,  my  friend, 
that  the  cigarette  to  which  you  seem  so  de- 
voted, uses  up  fully  ten  per  cent  of  your 
vital  force — of  your  capital  stock  of  energy  ? 
It  deadens  the  resolution  in  your  will,  para- 
lyzes your  nerves,  and  relaxes  your  grip,  as 
it  were.  Throw  it  away,  and  resolve  that 
forever  more  you  will  be  master  of  the  sit- 
uation, and  that  no  such  untidy  or  debilitating 


LIFE'S  FIRST  LESSONS.  235 

habit  shall  hold  you  captive  at  its  feet. 
And  then  your  occasional  dissipations  and 
late  hours,  they  consume  another  large  per- 
centage of  your  vitality  ;  and  ere  you  are 
aware  you  find  a  habit  of  indolence  and  in- 
difference stealing  over  you,  and  your  ven- 
tures bring  you  no  return. 

"But,"  do  you  ask,  "  would  you  deny 
young  people  all  recreation — all  pleasure  ?" 
By  no  means  ;  but  we  would  have  you  to 
realize  that  there  is  no  true  pleasure  in  aught 
that  hurts  or  degrades.  Work  may  be 
made  a  pleasure  and  a  joy  when  it  leads  to 
success.  An  earnest,  clean  life,  may  be 
made  a  perpetual  recreation,  in  the  pursuit 
of  simple  duty.  You  can  not  afford  to  waste 
your  golden  moments — the  sweet  spring- 
time of  your  years — in  frivolity  and  nonsense. 
You  should  pick  your  companions,  if  possible, 
from  those  above  your  intellectual  level— 
from  those  who  can  lift  you  up,  not  pull  you 
down.  At  the  same  time  you  should  be 
reasonably  unselfish  in  your  endeavors  to 
lift  up  those  who  are  beneath  you  to  your 
level.  When  you  find  that  you  can  be  no 
longer  of  any  use  to  your  companion,  nor  he 


236  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

to  you,  cut  loose  from  him — kindly  but  ef- 
fectually. 

And  so,  bravely  and  manfully,  bend  your 
young  energies  to  the  work  of  character- 
building,  determined  to  be  a  man  among 
men.  Your  own  good  sense  should  teach 
you  the  right  way — what  is  necessary  for 
your  soul-growth — for  your  highest  welfare. 
Old  age  will  creep  upon  you  so  quickly  that 
you  will  wonder  what  has  become  of  the 
fleeting  years.  Your  golden  opportunities, 
one  by  one,  will  slip  through  your  fingers, 
unless  you  watch  them  closely,  and  you  will 
find  yourself  with  whitened  locks  and  bowed 
form,  standing  upon  the  margin  of  life's 
swiftly-flowing  river,  another  failure. 

O,  thrice  happy  he,  at  such  a  time,  who 
can  look  back  over  a  life  well  spent,  and  can 
feel  as  he  goes  out  into  the  unknown,  that 
he  carries  with  him  a  bank  account  of  soul 
that  shall  last  him  for  all  eternity. 

THE  man  who  tries  to  lift  himself  up  by 
pulling  any  fellow-being  down,  is  a  long  way 
back  in  the  process  of  evolution. 


AT  THEIR  BEST, 


!HO  that  has  read  "  David  Copperfield," 
that  incomparable  creation  of  the  mas- 
ter's pen,  can  ever  forget  Steerforth, — the 
wild,  reckless,  wicked  Steerforth, — and  yet 
with  such  streaks  of  grand  manliness  running 
through  his  character  as  to  make  him  at 
times  almost  a  god.  In  his  last  interview 
with  Copperfield,  he  said  to  him,  with  the 
memory  of  all  their  old  friendship  welling 
forth  in  his  heart :  "  Daisy  "  —the  pet  name 
he  called  him  by — "  Daisy,  if  anything  should 
ever  separate  us,  you  must  think  of  me  at 
my  best,  old  boy.  Come  !  Let  us  make 
that  bargain.  Think  of  me  at  my  best." 

May  not  this  tender  pleading  of  the  way- 
ward Steerforth  find  a  response  in  other 
hearts — in  all  hearts  who  read  these  lines,— 
and  may  it  become  their  rule  of  action  through 
all  the  coming  years.  How  much  better 
would  the  world  be  for  it  if  men  and  women 
thought  only  of  each  other  at  their  best. 
How  it  would  stimulate  all  souls  to  live  only 


238  OUR    SUNDAY  TALKS. 

their  best,  and  aspire  to  be  worthy  the  best 
thoughts  of  their  fellows.  We  look  upon 
the  cold  and  silent  face  of  a  dead  friend  or 
acquaintance,  and  with  hearts  aglow  with 
tender  pathos,  we  remember  only  his  good 
qualities.  His  virtues  shine  out  brightly  and 
beautifully,  eclipsing  whatever  of  fault  or 
weakness,  or  vice,  there  may  have  been  in 
his  character.  Why  should  we  wait  till  the 
winter  of  death  sets  its  icy  seal  on  heart  and 
lips,  before  we  are  ready  to  think  the  kindly 
thought  which  is  as  ennobling  to  ourselves 
as  it  would  be  to  the  one  on  whom  it  is 
bestowed. 

The  human  race  is  yet  in  its  moral  and 
spiritual  infancy.  It  is  slowly  but  surely 
struggling  up  the  hights.  On  every  hand 
are  the  foot-sore,  and  weary,  and  faltering. 
Some  are  borne  down  with  heavy  burdens 
that  have  been  transmitted  to  them  by  an 
ignorant  and  sinful  ancestry.  Others  seem 
recklessly  squandering  the  golden  hours  and 
opportunities  of  their  lives,  and  thereby 
making  for  themselves  beds  of  thorns  for 
their  future  years.  But  if  He  whom  the 
record  informs  us  "  spake  not  as  man  spake," 


"AT    THEIR    BEST.  239 

could  say  to  the  erring  one,  "  Neither  do  I 
condemn  thee  ;  go  and  sin  no  more,"  where- 
fore should  the  best  of  us  frail  mortals  pre- 
sume to  sit  in  judgment  upon  our  fellows  ? 
Can  we  fathom  the  mysteries  of  the  erring 
soul,  or  weigh  the  motives  that  prompt  it  to 
action  ? 

The  great  want  of  the  world  is  charity  and 
good  will  to  man.  There  is  something  of 
the  best  in  every  life  ;  and  this  is  the  plant 
we  should  nurture  with  the  tenderest  care. 
Then  let  us  begin  to  think  of  each  other  "at 
their  best."  It  is  thus  that  the  wilderness  of 
human  nature  can  be  made  to  blossom  as 
the  rose. 


THE  best  service  most  rich  men  can  render 
to  the  world  is  to  get  out  of  it  and  give 
somebody  else  a  chance.  (This  does  not 
refer  to  the  rich  man  who  turns  his  wealth  to 
noble  uses.) 

EIGHT-HOUR  laws  are  a  blessing  only  to 
such  persons  as  are  capable  of  making  a  good 
use  of  their  unemployed  time. 


240  OUR  SUNDAY   TALKS. 

MY  ISLAND  HOME 


"  A  mighty  realm  is  the  land  of  dreams, 
With  steps  that  haug  in  the  midnight  sky; 
There  are  weltering  oceans,  and  trailing  streams 
That  gleam  where  the  dusky  valleys  lie." 


i  DWELL  in  a  beautiful  land  - 

On  an  island  than  Eden  more  fair, 
Where  storm  clouds  ne'er  darken  the  day, 

Nor  pestilence  poisons  the  air. 
There  are  bowers  of  purple  and  gold. 

Where   the  birds  sing  their  sweetest  for  me, 
And  magical  beauties  untold, 

Adorn  my  dear  isle  of  the  sea. 

I've  a  palace  of  marble  and  pearl, 

With  terraces  glittering  white, 
Mid  groves  of  the  orange  and  lime, 

And  fountains  that  dance  in  the  light; 
Near  a  lake,  where  the  sky  overhead 

Is  reflected  in  azure  below, 
Whose  margin  is  soft  to  my  tread — 

Where  the  myrtle  and  columbine  grow. 

The  vines  bend  their  emerald  heads 

To  receive  the  moist  kiss  of  the  wave, 
While  blushingflv  watches  the  rose 


MY    ISLAND    HOME.  24! 

From  the  shore  that  the  bright  waters  lave. 
The  zephyrs  that  sport  with  the  flowers, 

Are  laden  with  many  a  sweet, 
And  trippingly  glide  by  the  hours, 

Where  I  dwell  in  my  sylvan  retreat. 

When  weary  with  heart-aching  cares— 

When  sorrow  and  heaviness  come, 
I  step  in  my  light  fairy  barge, 

And  hie  to  my  bright  island  home. 
Loved  voices  will  welcome  me  there, 

And  lift  the  dark  pall  from  my  heart, 
Fond  Hope  take  the  place  of  despair, 

And  Peace  her  soft  sunlight  impart. 

Where,  do  you  ask,  is  this  land 

That  in  beauty  an  Eden  outvies  ? 
It  exists  in  the  realm  of  my  dreams   - 

In  the  ocean  of  fancy  it  lies. 
Shut  out,  far  away,  from  the  Real, 

From  the  world  and  its  harassing  strife, 
I  live  in  the  blissful  ideal, 

And  cull  the  dream  roses  of  life. 


A  KIND  act  performed  without  the  hope  of 
reward  in  this  world  or  the  next,  is  a  better 
evidence  of  true  gentility  of  soul  and  a  gen- 
uine Christian  character,  than  a  belief  in  all 
the  creeds  of  Christendom. 


242  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

LDYE    DF  THE    BEAUTIFUL, 


JHERE  is  a  ludicrous  side  to  almost  every- 
thing in  life — even  to  the  most  serious. 
The  useful,  the  beautiful,  the  good, — the 
holiest  emotions  and  aspirations  of  the  soul,— 
sorrow,  affliction,  and  even  death  itself, — all 
come  in  for  their  share  of  ridicule,  at  times, 
and  are  distorted  to  gratify  the  fun- loving 
propensity  of  human  nature. 

The  esthetic  craze  is  just  now  the  humor- 
ous sensation  of  the  hour.  The  teachings  of 
the  great  English  esthete,  Oscar  Wilde,  the 
so-called  Apostle  of  the  Beautiful,  are  every- 
where distorted  to  minister  to  the  sense  of 
the  ludicrous.  Our  language  is  being  vitiated 
into  a  senseless  jargon — with  its  "  too  too 
utterly  utter  "  forms  of  extravagant  expression, 
and  Wilde  combinations  of  meaningless 
phrases — -to  add  to  the  already  voluminous 
glossary  of  American  slang. 

And  yet  who  shall  say  there  is  not  a  grand 
thought  underlying  all  this  nonsense — a 
much-needed  lesson  for  the  race  ?  It  teaches 


LOVE  OF  THE  BEAUTIFUL.  243 

a  love  for  the  beautiful — for  the  adornment 
and  decoration  of  common  things — for  the 
poetry  and  sentiment,  as  well  as  the  prosy 
and  practical  in  life, — -just  as  the  soldier,  in 
his  peaceful  parades  and  marches,  decorates 
his  implements  of  death  with  ribbons  and 
flowers.  • 

If  he  who  makes  two  blades  of  grass  to  grow 
where  but  one  grew  before,  is  entitled  to  the 
gratitude  of  his  race  ;  thrice  blessed  he  who 
carries  a  ray  of  sunshine  into  any  sorrowing 
heart,  or  with  gladdening  words  or  acts  of 
kindness  lightens  the  burden  of  any  weary 
life. 

There  is  in  this  humdrum  world  of  ours— 
this  world  of  work  and  worry,  of  toil  and 
tears — all  too  little  of  the  ornamental.  We 
delve  and  dig  with  our  eyes  downward,  all 
oblivious  of,  or  indifferent  to,  the  world  of 
beauty  around  us.  Why,  Nature  herself  is  a 
grand  old  Esthete.  She  always  adorns  her 
roughest  and  most  unsightly  places  with 
something  of  the  beautiful — with  some  flower, 
or  trailing  vine,  or  mossy  cushion,  to  gladden 
the  eye.  Even  her  mountain  peaks,  robed 
in  eternal  snows,  wear  their  crowns  of  stars  ; 


244  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

and  the  chafed  waves  of  her  ocean  wastes 
flash  with  the  scintillant  glories  of  the  night. 

There  is  no  home  so  humble  that  it  may 
not  be  made  beautiful  and  attractive  by  the 
skillful  exercise  of  taste.  The  veriest  cabin 
may  be  turned  into  a  bower  of  beauty  and 
loveliness,  where  the  soul  can  revel  in  the 
purest  joys,  and  take  upon  itself  something 
of  its  beautiful  surroundings. 

And  this,  after  all,  is  the  highest  use  and 
end  of  life  :  an  esthetic  and  beautiful  soul — a 
soul  adorned  with  all  things  lovely — with 
aspirations  outreaching  to  the  skies — with 
the  gentle  star-eyed  flowers  of  charity  and 
humanity  shedding  their  fragrance  all  around, 
—a  soul  that  is  keenly  alive  to  all  things 
good  and  true — that  drinks  in  the  glory  of 
the  universe, — that  grows  wise  and  beautiful 
with  time,  and  at  last  ascends  "  the  golden 
stair  to  a  better  life  beyond. 


A  SOFT,  low  word,  in  kindness  spoken — a 
radiant  face  beaming  with  love  and  sympa- 
thy— are  dews  from  heaven,  distilling  sweet 
hope  and  courage  to  weary-ladened  hearts. 


DUR  SPIDER, 


;NUGLY  ensconsed  within  a  roll  of  manu- 
script, in  the  northeast  upper  pig-eon 
hole  of  our  desk,  there  lives  a  little  brown 
spider,  scarcely  as  large  as  a  common  house 
fly.  Every  night  it  comes  out  from  its 
little  nest  and  spins  a  large  beautiful  web,— 
which,  every  morning,  we  ruthlessly  brush 
away.  For  two  full  weeks  have  we  tried  to 
exhaust  the  patience  of  this  little  insect,  but 
without  avail.  With  its  house  in  ruins,  and 
bankrupt  in  all  save  perseverance,  it  pa- 
tiently goes  to  work  to  repair  the  loss. 
From  every  indication  our  little  intruder 
intends  to  ''fight  it  out  on  that  line,"  as  long 
as  life  and  instinct  shall  last.  Feeling  some- 
what in  a  moralizing  mood,  we  propose  to 
deduce  a  lesson  from  the  example  set  by  our 
little  insect  toiler.  Where  is  the  person 
who,  in  the  face  of  such  oft-repeated  mis- 
fortunes, would  have  the  heart  to  struggle 
on?  Would  he  not  sit  down  and  bewail  his 
hard  fate,  and  suffer  the  grim  specter,  Want, 


246  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

to  enter  in  and  become  a  guest  at  his  fire- 
side ?  An  individual  struggling  manfully  and 
cheerfully  against  misfortune  is  a  noble 
spectacle.  The  face  may  be  sunbrowned, 
and  the  hands  sinewy  with  toil,  yet  the  real 
diamond  of  the  soul  shines  all  the  brighter 
for  its  rough  setting.  He  is  twice  a  man 
who  has  struggled  with,  and  come  off  con- 
queror over,  some  great  sorrow.  No  one 
can  truly  appreciate  the  blessing  of  health 
who  has  never  languished  on  a  bed  of  sick- 
ness ;  neither  can  one  fully  realize  how  much 
of  heaven  it  is  possible  to  enjoy  on  earth 
who  has  never  felt  the  pangs  of  hell  in  his 
spirit.  The  lesson  of  the  spider,  then,  is  one 
of  patient  industry.  It  teaches  us  to  do  our 
best,  and  then  if  misfortune  comes,  to  "  try 
again,"  and  to  keep  on  trying,  patiently, 
hopefully,  trustingly,  as  long  as  life  and 
strength  shall  last. 


SUFFERING  brings  strength  to  strong  minds, 
makes  pure  souls  purer,  ennobles  noble 
hearts,  and  lifts  elevated  natures  to  hights 
sublime. 


RANDOM  THDUG-HTS, 


4 '  SELF-PRESERVATION  is  the  first  law  of 
nature,"  in  a  moral  as  well  as  in  a  physical 
sense. 

IT  is  better  to  be  born  right  the  first  time 
than  to  take  any  chances  on  the  possibility 
of  getting  right  afterwards. 

HE  who  lives  meanly  will  naturallv  think 
meanly,  and  act  meanly  ;  and  meanness  of 
any  kind  is  unworthy  a  noble  soul. 

IT  is  better  for  laboring  men  to  have 
steady  employment  at  low  wages  than  to 
work  one-half  the  time  at  high  wages. 

THE  human  being  who  hasn't  a  tear  in  his 
heart  for  another's  woe,  is  undeserving  of 
human  sympathy  in  his  own  extremity. 

EVIL  DOERS  can  be  reformed  more  quickly 
and  effectually  by  encouragement  to  do  right, 
than  by  condemnation  for  their  evil  ways. 

HE  serves  God  best  who  best  serves  his 
fellow  men.  (Borrowed  from  the  teachings 
of  our  elder  brothers,  Confucius  and  Jesus.) 


248  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

POVERTY  and  riches  are  but  relative  terms 
—gauzy  figments  of  the  brain.     He  only  is 
poor  who   is   poor   in   soul,  and   he  is  poor 
indeed. 

PARENTAL  love  and  tenderness  will  do 
more  to  restrain  the  wayward  feet  of  an 
erring  child  than  all  the  harsh  measures  ever 
devised. 

THERE  would  be  scarcely  any  jostling  in 
the  journey  of  life  if  everybody  would  but 
observe  the  law  of  the  road  and  "  keep  to 
the  right." 

BEFORE  you  conclude  to  do  your  neighbor 
an  injury,  consider  well  whether  it  would 
not  add  more  to  your  own  happiness  to  be- 
friend him. 

THE  husband  who  begrudgingly  gives  to 
his  wife  what  is  as  much  hers  as  his,  is 
deserving  of  a  wife  mean  enough  to  steal 
from  his  purse  while  he  is  asleep. 

THE  soil  is  the  common  heritage  of  the 
race,  and  no  man  should  be  allowed  to  hold 
any  more  of  it  than  he  can  use  to  the  greatest 
good  of  himself  and  the  greatest  number  of 
his  fellows. 


OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS.  249 

IF  eternal  progression  is  not  an  unerring 
law  of  nature,  then  the  history  of  the  rocks 
is  a  stupendous  falsehood, — and  if  it  is  such  a 
law,  then  the  nebulous  theory  of  creation  is  a 
foregone  conclusion. 

THE  attempt  to  live  in  a  hundred  dollar 
style  on  a  fifty'  dollar  income — a  prevailing 
weakness  of  the  American  people — is  a 
source  of  more  misery  than  intemperance  or 
war. 

THE  world's  real  thinkers,  who  are  com- 
paratively few  in  numbers,  are  oftentimes 
misunderstood,  and  crucified  by  those  who, 
as  of  old,  "know  not  what  they  do." 

THE  •  man  who  sneers  at  the  honor  of 
woman,  or  who  boasts  of  his  success  in  any 
ignoble  department  of  physical  life,  is  a 
beast.  (We  beg  pardon  of  the  beasts,) 

THE  unsophisticated  young  man  who 
wagers  his  money  with  a  professional  gam- 
bler at  cards,  with  the  idea  that  he  has  the 
least  chance  to  win,  exhibits  a  degree  of 
verdancy  that  would  pass  for  a  fair  article  of 
idiocy. 


2  SO  OUR  SUNDAY    TALKS. 


CLEDFATRA'S  DREAM, 


SO!  by  Nilus'  languid  water.; 

Fade:$  the  dreamy  Summer  day, 
Where,  on  couch  of  gold  and  crimson, 

Egypt's  royal  daughter  lay- 
Dreaming  lay,  while  palm  and  pillar 

Cast  their  lengthening  shadows  mw, 
And  the  lotus- ladened  zaphyrs 
Lightly  kiss  her  queenly  brow. 

Soft,  the  evening  steals  up3n  her, 

As  behind  the  curtained  west 
Sinks  the  Day  God  in  his  splendor — 

Folds  his  wooing  arms  to  rest. 
Drowsy  shapes  of  dusky  Egypt 

Homeward,  slow,  their  burdens  bear, 
While  the  boatman's  lazy  challenge 

Falls  upon  the  quivering  air. 

Dreams  she  of  her  Roman  lover — 

He  who  cast  a  crown  away — 
Country,  kindred,  fame  arid  honor, 

In  her  captive  arms  to  lay? 
Ay  el  of  Antony,  her  hero, 

Sharer  of  heart  and  throne — 
He  whose  ships  now  homeward  sailing, 

Bear  her  all  of  love  alone. 


CLEOPATRA S    DREAM.  25! 

Starts  she  in  her  sleeping  glory. 

And  her  brown  arm *,  jeweled,  bare, 
Round  and  rich  in  queenly  baauty, 

Wildly  cleave  the  slumbrous  air. 
Beads  of  perspiration  gather 

On  her  matchless  woman's  brjw, 
While  her  parted  lips  in  anguish 

Tell  of  heart  pangs  none  may  know. 

Sure,  some  vision,  dire  and  dreadful, 

Palls  upon  her  eyes  and  brain, 
Piercing  to  her  being's  center. 

With  a  fiery  shaft  of  pain. 
Like  a  sea,  her  full  orbed  bosom 

Swells  and  falls  with  pent  up  ire; 
Then  her  spirit  breaks  its  thraldom. 

And  she  shrieks  in  wild  despair: 

"  Charmian,  quick,  unloose  my  girdle, 

Give  me  breath — I  faint,  I  die ! 
Ho!  slaves,  bring  my  royal  galley, 

Let  us  hence  from  Egypt  fly. 
O,  for  vengeance  on  the  traitor, 

And  upon  his  Roman  bride; — 
Let  him  never  dare — ah,  Charmian, 

Stand  you  closely  by  my  side. 

* '  Do  I  dream  ?     Is  this  my  palace — 

Yon  my  smoothly  flowing  Nile  ? 
Ah,  I  see — O,  great  Osiris, 

How  I  thank  thee  for  thy  smile! 


252  OUR  SUNDAY  TALKS. 

O,  I've  had  such  fearful  vision, — 

He,  my  Antony,  untrue; 
And  my  heart  was  nigh  to  bursting 

With  its  fearful  weight  of  woe. 

"  But  'tis  over;  Jet^i  tremble- 
On  what  blink  of  fate  I1  stand; 

What  prophetic  bird  of  evil 
Hovers  o'er  this  sacred  land ! 

What  if  true  should  come  my  dreaming, 
And  no  more  my  love  returns! 

Ah!  the   thought  my  heart's  blood  freezes, 
While  my  brain  with  madness  burns.'' 

Then  she  listens,  gazing  outward, 

Towards  a  dim  futurity, — 
And  the  Nile,  forever  onward, 

Bears  its  burdens  to  the  sea, — 
And  she  catches  from  its  whispers — 

Echoing  whispers  in  her  soul — 
That  her  reign  of  love  is  ended, 

And  her  life  is  near  its  goal. 


YB  (334 


